The boys' life of Edison

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EDISON AT WORK IN ONE OF THE CHEAIICAL ROOMS AT THE ORANGE
LABORATORY

THE BOYS'

LIFE OF EDISON

BY

WILLIAM H. MEADOWCROFT

OF THE EDISON LABORATORY. AUTHOR OF
"aBC of ELECTRICITY," "aBC OF THE X-RAYS"

WITH AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

BY MR. EDISON
ILLUSTRATED

HARPER ^ BROTHERS PUBLISHERS

NEW YORK AND LONDON

dtt.H'Z'H

Boys' Life op Edisom

Copyright, 1911. 19a i, by Harper & Brothers

Printed in the United States of America

E-E

CONTENTS

TT5^

CHAP. PAGE

Introduction ix

I. The Early Days of Electricity i

II. Edison's Family 5

III. Edison's Early Boyhood 15

IV. The Young Newsboy 21

V. A Few Stories of Edison's Newsboy Days 32

VI. The Young Telegraph Operator 41

VII. Adventures of a Telegraph Operator . . 49

VIII. Work and Invention in Boston 75

IX. From Poverty to Independence 88

X. A Busy Young Inventor loi

XI. The Telephone, Motograph, and Microphone 117

XII. Making a Machine Talk 129

XIII. A New Light in the World 135

XIV. Menlo Park 145

XV. Beginning the Electric Light Business . . 153

XVI. The First Edison Central Station .... 161

, XVII. Edison's Electric Railway 169

XVIII. Grinding Mountains to Dust 177

XIX. Edison Makes Portland Ch:ment 187

XX. Motion-Pkttkes 195

XXI. Edison invents a Nev/ Storage Battery . 202

XXII. Edison's Miscellaneous Inventions .... 209

XXIII. Edison's Method in Inventing 216

XXIV. Edison's Laboratory at Orange 224

XXV. Edison Himself 233

XXVI. Edison's New Phonograph 240

XXVII. Edison's Work During the War 250

Events and Achievements of Edison .... 265

V

ILLUSTRATIONS

EDISON AT WORK IN ONE OF THE CHEMICAL ROOMS
AT THE ORANGE LABORATORY

EDISON WHEN ABOUT FOURTEEN OR FIFTEEN
YEARS OF AGE

MR. EDISON AT THE CLOSE OF FIVE DAYS AND
NIGHTS OF CONTINUED WORK IN PERFECTING
THE EARLY WAX-CYLINDER TYPE OF PHONO-
GRAPH— JUNE 1 6, 1888

THE EDISON ELECTRIC RAILWAY AT MENLO PARK —
1880

EDISON AT THE OFFICE DOOR OF THE ORE-CONCEN-
TRATING PLANT AT EDISON, NEW JERSEY, IN
THE 'nineties

THOMAS ALVA EDISON — I9II

" THE INSOMNIA SQUAD "

EDISON AT WORK ON RUBBER EXPERIMENTS. FROM
A MOVING PICTURE TAKEN DECEMBER, 1 928 .

Frontispiece
Facing p. 26

" 132
" 170

tt

182

t(

234

<<

244

l<

262

vu

INTRODUCTION

THIS is the story of a great inventor, the most
conspicuous figure of the age of electricity.

The story is largely autobiography, for, through
the author's association with Mr. Edison, it has been
possible often to obtain his own narrative of his
life. For nearly thirty-one years the author has had
the privilege of a connection with Mr. Edison and
the Edison companies, and at present he is acting as
Mr. Edison's assistant. Every page of the book has
been read by Mr. Edison himself, and it is published
with his approval as the authoritative story of his
life to the present time.

It is probably as a worker of wonders, an inter-
preter of the secrets of Nature, an actual wizard
of science, that Edison fascinates the imagination
of almost every boy. In this picture of the actual
facts of the inventor's life the reader will find that
while Edison is just as great as imagined, yet this
greatness has not been reached by chance, but hon-
estly earned by the hardest kind of hard work and
the most intense and earnest application. The won-
derful things that he has accomplished have been
the things that he purposely set out to do, and are
not the result of some happy thought, or blind luck,
or chance.

There has been but little abatement in Mr. Edi-
ix

INTRODUCTION

son's activities. The flight of time has not dimmed
his vivid imagination; has brought no change to his
clear broad mental vision; nor has his capacity for
intensive, forceful work perceptibly lessened. There
is no telling what other inventions he may yet make
to benefit the world, but if he never added any-
thing to what he has already done, his life and
achievements afford the telling of one of the most
remarkable stories in the history of the world.

The author has had the honor and pleasure of
assisting in the preparation of a large and compre-
hensive biography entitled, Edison: His Life and
Inventions, by Frank L. Dyer and T. Commerford
Martin, published by the publishers of the present
volume. He gratefully acknowledges the fact that
certain features of this book have been adapted
from the pages of that elaborate biography. For
the permission to do this he tenders his thanks to
his friends Frank L. Dyer and the late T. Commer-
ford Martin.

William H. Meadowcroft.

THE BOYS' LIFE OF
EDISON

THE EARLY DAYS OF ELECTRICITY

THIS is the life story of the greatest of inventors
in the field of electricity. It is true that Thomas
A. Edison has helped the progress of the world by
many other inventions and discoveries quite outside
of electricity, but it is in this field that he is best
known. Now, in this age of electricity, it happens
very fortunately that a close personal association
with Mr. Edison makes it possible at last to tell
younger readers the real story of Mr. Edison's life,
partly in his own words. It has been a life full of
surprises as well as of great achievements, and one
of the surprises which we meet at the start is that,
unlike Mozart, who showed his musical genius in
infancy, and unlike others devoted to one thing from
the outset, Edison took up electricity almost by
accident.

Yet this is not so^ strange when we think how
little electricity there was to take up in the middle
of the nineteenth century. Electricity was not
studied in the schools. It was not a separate art or

I

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

business. Men of science had occupied themselves
with electricity for a long time, but they really did
not know as much about it as a bright boy in the
upper grammar grades to-day. Speaking in a very
general way, we may say that simple frictional elec-
tricity^ was an old story, that Franklin had dis-
covered the identity of electricity and lightning, and
that Galvani had discovered in 1790 and Volta had
developed in 1801 the generating of electric currents
from batteries composed of zinc and copper plates
immersed in sulphuric acid.

But it was not until 1835, only twelve years before
Edison was born, that Samuel F. B. Morse applied
electrical currents to the sending of an alphabet of
dots and dashes by wire. Thus it was in the infancy
of telegraphy that Edison first saw the light.

Telegraph apparatus in those early days was of
a crude and cumbersome kind — quite different from
that which young students experiment with at the
present time. For instance, the receiving magnets
of the earliest telegraphs, which performed the same
office as the modern sounders, weighed seventy-five
pounds instead of a few ounces.

It was a very difficult undertaking for Morse to
establish the telegraph after he had invented it. It
was such a new idea that the public could not seem
to understand its use and possibilities. People
would not believe that it was possible to send mes-
sages regularly over a long stretch of wire, and,
even if it were possible, that it would be of much

^ Made by rubbing certain objects together, like amber and
silk, the original discovery over two thousand years ago.

2

EARLY DAYS OF ELECTRICITY

use anyway. It took him a long time to raise money
to put up a telegraph line between Baltimore and
Washington. Before this, he had offered to sell the
whole invention outright to the United States Gov-
ernment for one hundred thousand dollars; but the
Government did not buy, as the invention was not
thought to be worth that much money.

In 1847, the year Edison was born, there were
only a few telegraph circuits in existence. The far-
thest line to the west was in Pittsburgh, Pennsyl-
vania. It was in this early telegraph office that
Andrew Carnegie was a messenger boy. We could
name a great many more notable men in our country
who began their careers in a similar way, or as tele-
graph operators, in the early days of telegraphy, but
space forbids.

Within a few years after Edison was born there
came a great boom in telegraphy, and new lines were
put up all over the country. Thus, by the time he
had grown to boyhood the telegraph was a well-
established business, and the first great electrical
industry became a pronounced success.

There were no other electrical industries at this
time, except electro-plating to a limited extent. The
chief reason of this was probably that the only
means of obtaining electrical current was by means
of chemical batteries, as mechanical generators had
not been developed at that time.

While the principles of the dynamo-electric ma-
chine had been discovered, and a few of these
machines and small electric motors had been made
by scientists, in the middle of the nineteenth century

3

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

such machines were little more than scientific toys,
and not to be compared with the generators of
modern days.

Edison, therefore, was born at the very beginning
of "The Age of Electricity," which can be said to
have actually begun about 1840, or soon after.

It is not too much to say that the many important
and practical inventions that he has since contributed
to the electrical arts have had no small weight in
causing the present time to be known as "The Age
of Electricity."

II

Edison's family

HAD there not been a family difference of opinion
about the War of Independence, we might
never have had Edison the great inventor.

The first Edisons in this country came over from
Holland about the year 1730. They v^ere descend-
ants of a family of millers on the Zuyder Zee, and
when they came to America they first settled near
Caldwell, New Jersey.

Later on they removed to some land along the
Passaic River. It is a curious and interesting co-
incidence that a hundred and sixty years later Mr.
Edison established the home he now occupies in the
Orange Mountains, which is in the same general
neighborhood.

The family must have gotten along well in the
world, for we find the name of Thomas Edison, as
a bank official on Manhattan Island, signed to Con-
tinental currency in 1778. This was Mr. Edison's
great-grandfather, who lived to be one hundred and
four years of age.

It will be seen from the date, 1778, that this
was during the time of the War of Independence.
This Thomas Edison was a stanch patriot, who thor-
oughly believed in American independence. He had
a son named John, who differed with his father in

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

political principles and favored a continuance of
British rule.

After the war was over John left the country,
and, with many other Loyalists, emigrated to Nova
Scotia and settled there. While he still lived there
a son was born to him, at Digby, in 1804. This
son was named Samuel, who became the father of
Thomas Alva Edison, the inventor.

Seven years later John Edison, as a Loyalist, be-
came entitled under the laws of Canada to a grant
of six hundred acres of land, and moved westward
with his family to take possession of it. He made
his way through the State of New York in wagons
drawn by oxen to the township of Bayfield, in upper
Canada, on Lake Huron, and there settled down.

Some time afterward John Edison moved from
Bayfield to Vienna, Ontario, on the northern bank
of Lake Erie. As will be understood from the
above, he was the grandfather of Mr. Edison, who
gives this recollection of the old man in those early
Canadian days :

''When I was five years old I was taken by my
father and mother on a visit to Vienna. We were
driven by a carriage from Milan, Ohio, to a rail-
road, then to a port on Lake Erie, thence by a canal-
boat in a tow of several miles to Port Burwell, in
Canada, across the lake, and from there we drove
to Vienna, a short distance away. I remember my
grandfather perfectly as he appeared at one hundred
and two years of age, when he died. In the middle
of the day he sat under a large tree in front of the
house, facing a well-traveled road. His head was

6

EDISON'S FAMILY

covered completely with a large quantity of very
white hair, and he chewed tobacco incessantly, nod-
ding to friends as they passed by. He used a very
large cane, and walked from the chair to the house,
resenting any assistance. I viewed him from a dis-
tance, and could never get very close to him. I
remember some large pipes, and especially a molasses
jug, a trunk, and several other things that came
from Holland/'

John Edison was long-lived, like his father, and
died at the age of one hundred and two. Little is
known of the early manhood of his son Samuel
(Thomas A. Edison's father), until we find him
keeping a hotel at Vienna, and in 1828 marrying
Miss Nancy Elliott, who was a school-teacher there.

He was six feet in height, and was possessed of
great strength and vigor. He took a lively share in
the troublous politics of the period.

In 1837 the Canadian Rebellion broke out. The
cause of it was the same as that which led to the
War of Independence in America — ^taxation without
representation.

Samuel Edison was so ardently interested and of
such strong character that he became a captain in the
insurgent forces that rallied under the banners of
Papineau and Mackenzie.

The rebellion failed, however, and those who had
taken part in it were severely dealt with. Many of
the insurgents went in exile to Bermuda, but Samuel
Edison preferred the perils of a flight to the United
States. He therefore departed from Canada with
his wife, hurriedly and secretly.

7

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

There was a romantic and thrilling journey of one
hundred and eighty-two miles toward safety. The
country through which they passed was then very
wild and infested with Indians of unfriendly dis-
position, and the journey was made almost entirely
without food or sleep.

They arrived safely in the United States, however,
and, after a few years spent in various towns along
the shores of Lake Erie, finally came to Milan, Ohio,
in 1842. Here they settled down and made their
home, for the place gave great promise of abundance
of business and prosperity.

In those days railroads were few and far between,
and there was none near Milan. The great quanti-
ties of grain that were grown in the surrounding
country were sent to Eastern ports by sailing ves-
sels over the lake. Milan was connected by a wide
canal with the Huron River, which emptied into
Lake Erie. Thus the town became a busy port,
with grain warehouses and elevators, at which as
many as twenty sailing vessels were loaded in a
single day.

There also sprang up a brisk ship-building indus-
try, for which the abundant forests of the region
supplied the necessary lumber.

You will see, therefore, that Mr. Edison's father
gave evidence of shrewd judgment v/hen he decided
to make his permanent home at Milan, for there
was plenty of occupation, with every prospect of
prosperity. He was always ready to look on the
brightest side of everything, and could and did turn
his hand to many occupations.

8

EDISON^S FAMILY

He decided to make his chief business the manu-
facture of shingles, for which there was a large
demand, both in the neighborhood and along the
shores of the lake. The shingles were made mostly
of Canadian wood, which was imported for the pur-
pose. They were made entirely by hand and of first-
class wood, and so well did they last that a house
in Milan on which these shingles were put in 1844
was still in excellent condition forty-two years later.
Samuel Edison did well in this business and em-
ployed a number of men.

In a few years after the family had made their
home at Milan, Thomas Alva Edison was born there,
on February 11, 1847.

His mother was an attractive and highly educated
woman, and her influence upon his disposition has
been profound and lasting. She was born in
Chenango County, New York, in 18 10, and was the
daughter of the Rev. John Elliott, a Baptist min-
ister, and descendant of an old Revolutionary sol-
dier, Capt. Ebenezer Elliott, of Scotch descent.

The Elliott family was evidently one of consider-
able culture and deep religious feeling, for two of
Mrs. Elliott's uncles and two brothers were also in
the Baptist ministry. As a young woman she be-
came a teacher in the public high school at Vienna,
Ontario, and thus met her husband, who was resid-
ing there.

The Edison family consisted of three children,
two boys and a girl. Besides Thomas Alva, there
was an elder brother, William Pitt, and a sister
named Tannie. Both brother and sister had con-

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

siderable ability, although in different lines. Wil-
liam Pitt Edison was clever with his pencil, and
there was at one time an idea of having him become
an art student ; but evidently the notion was not car-
ried out, for later in life he was manager of the
local street-railway lines at Port Huron, Michigan,
in which he was heavily interested.

This talent for sketching seems to run in the
family, for Thomas A. Edison's first impulse in dis-
cussing any mechanical question is to take up the
nearest piece of paper and make drawings. Scarcely
a day passes that this does not happen. His im-
mense number of note-books contain thousands of
such sketches.

His sister, who in later life became Mrs. Tannic
Edison Bailey, had, on the other hand, a great deal
of literary ability, and spent much of her time in
writing.

As a child the great inventor was not at all strong,
and was of fragile appearance. His head was well
shaped but very large, and it is said that local doc-
tors feared he might have brain trouble.

On account of his supposed delicacy, he was not
allowed to go to school at as early an age as is usual.
And when he did go, it was not for a long time. He
was usually at the foot of his class, and the teacher
had spoken of the boy to a school inspector as being
"addled."

Perhaps the reader can imagine the indignation of
his mother on hearing of this teacher's report. She
had watched and studied her boy closely, and knew
that he had a mind unusually receptive and mental

10

EDISON'S FAMILY

powers far beyond those of other children. So she
resolved to take him out of school and educate him
herself.

It was fortunate that Mr. Edison had a mother
who was not only loving, observing, and wise, but
at the same time well informed and ambitious. From
her experience as a teacher, she was able to give
him an education better than could be had in the
local schools of that day.

Under her care the boy formed studious habits
and a taste for good literature that have lasted to
this day. He is a great reader, and what has once
been read by him is never forgotten if it is in any
way useful.

When Edison was a child he was deeply interested
in the busy scenes of the canal and grain ware-
houses, and particularly in the ship-building yards.

He asked so many questions that he fairly tired
out his father, although the older man had no small
ability. It has been reported that other members of
the family regarded the boy as being mentally un-
balanced and likely to be a lifelong care to his
parents.

Even while he was quite a young child his me-
chanical tendencies showed themselves in his fond-
ness for building little plank roads from the pieces
of wood thrown out by the ship-building yards and
the sawmills. One day he was found in the village
square laboriously copying the signs of the stores.

To this day Mr. Edison is not inclined to accept
a statement unless he can prove it for himself by
experiment. Once, when he was about six years old,

II

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

he watched a goose sitting on her eggs and saw them
hatch. Soon after he was missing. By and by,
after an anxious search, his father found him sitting
in a nest he had made in the barn filled with goose
and hen eggs he had collected, trying to hatch them
out.

His remarkable memory was noticeable even when
he was a child, for before he was live years old he
had learned all the songs of the lumber gangs and
of the canal men. Even now his recollection goes
back to 1850, when, as a child three or four years
old, he saw camped in front of his home six covered
wagons, ^'prairie schooners," and witnessed their
departure for California, where gold had just been
discovered.

Another of his recollections of childhood is of a
sadder nature. He went off one day with another
boy to bathe in the creek. Soon after they entered
the water the other boy disappeared. Young Edison
waited around for about half an hour, and then, as
it was growing dark, went home, puzzled and
lonely, but said nothing about the matter. About
two hours afterward, when the missing boy was
being searched for, a man came to the Edison home
to make anxious inquiry of the companion with
whom he had last been seen. Edison told all the
circumstances with a painful sense of being in some
way guilty. The creek was at once dragged, and
then the body was recovered.

Edison himself had more than one narrow escape.
Of course, he fell into the canal and was nearly
drowned — few boys in Milan worth their salt

12

EDISON'S FAMILY

omitted that performance. On another occasion he
fell into a pile of wheat in a grain elevator and was
almost smothered. Holding the end of a skate-strap,
that another lad might cut it with an ax, he lost the
top of a finger. Fire also had its peril. He built
a fire in a barn, but the flames spread so rapidly that,
although he escaped himself, the barn was wholly
destroyed. He was publicly whipped in the village
square as a warning to other youths. Equally well
remembered is a dangerous encounter with a ram
which attacked him while he was busily engaged
digging out a bumblebee's nest near an orchard
fence, and was about to butt him again when he
managed to drop over on the safe side and escape.
He was badly hurt and bruised, and no small quan-
tity of arnica was needed for his wounds.

Meanwhile railroad building had been going on
rapidly, and the new Columbus, Sandusky & Hock-
ing Railroad had reached Milan and quickly deprived
it of its flourishing grain trade. The town, form-
erly so bustling and busy, no longer offered to so
active a man as Mr. Edison's father the opportunity
of conducting a prosperous business, so he decided to
move away. He was well-to-do, but he determined
to do better elsewhere. In 1854 he and his family
removed to Port Huron, Michigan, where they oc-
cupied a large Colonial house standing in the middle
of an old Government fort reservation of ten acres,
overlooking the St. Clair River just after it leaves
Lake Huron.

The old house at Milan where Mr. Edison was
born is still in existence, and is occupied at this

^3

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

time (1911) by Mr. S. O. Edison, a half-brother
of Edison's father, and a man of much abihty.

This birthplace of Edison still remains the plain,
substantial brick house it was originally, one-storied,
with rooms finished on the attic floor.

14

Ill

Edison's early boyhood

IT WAS when he was about seven years old that
Edison's parents moved to Port Huron, Mich-
igan, and it was there, a few years later, that he
began his active life by becoming a newsboy.

With his mother he found study easy and pleas-
ant. The quality of the education she gave him
may be judged from the fact that before he was
twelve years old he had studied the usual rudiments
and had read, with his mother's help. Gibbon's
Declhie and Fall of tite Roman Empire, Hume's
History of England, Sear's History of the World,
Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy, and the Diction-
ary of Sciences,

They even tried to struggle through Newton's
Principia, but the mathematics were too much for
both teacher and student. To this day Edison has
little personal use for arithmetic beyond that which
is called ''mental." He said to a friend, **I can
always hire some mathematicians, but they can't
hire me."

His father always encouraged his literary tastes,
and paid him a small sum for each book which he
mastered. Although there is no fiction in the list,
Edison has all his life enjoyed it, particularly the
works of such writers as Victor Hugo. Indeed,

IS

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

later on, when he became a telegraph operator, he
was nicknamed by his associates "Victor Hugo
Edison" — possibly because of his great admiration
for that writer.

When he was about eleven years old he became
greatly interested in chemistry. He got a copy of
Parker's School Philosophy^ an elementary book on
physics, and tried almost every experiment in it.
He also experimented on his own account. It is
said that he once persuaded a boy employed by the
family to swallow a large quantity of Seidlitz pow-
ders in the belief that the gases penetrated would
enable him to fly. The awful agonies of the victim
attracted attention, and Edison's mother marked her
displeasure by an application of the switch kept
behind the old Seth Thomas "grandfather's clock."

It was as early as this that young Alva, or "Al,"
as he was called, displayed a passion for chemistry,
which has never left him. He used the cellar of the
house for his experiments and collected there no
fewer than two hundred bottles from various places.
They contained the chemicals with which he was
constantly experimenting, and were all marked
"Poison," so that no one else Vv^ould disturb them.

He soon became familiar with all the chemicals
to be had at the local drug stores, for he did not
believe the statements made in his books until he
had tested them for himself.

Edison used such a large part of his mother's
cellar for this, his first laboratory, that, becoming-
tired of the "mess," she once ordered him to clear
out everything. The boy was so much distressed at

i6

EDISON'S EARLY BOYHOOD

this that she relented, but insisted that he must keep
things under lock and key when he was not there.

Most of his spare time was spent in the cellar, for
he did not share to any extent in the sports of the
boys of the neighborhood. His chum and chief com-
panion at this time was a Dutch boy, much older
than himself, named Michael Oates, who did chores
around the house. It was Michael upon whom the
Seidlitz powder experiment was tried.

As Edison got deeper into his chemical studies
his limited pocket-money disappeared rapidly. He
was being educated by his mother, and, therefore,
not attending a regular school, and he had read all
the books within reach. So he thought the matter
out and decided that if he became a train newsboy
he could earn all the money he wanted for his experi-
ments and also get fresh reading from papers and
magazines. Besides, if he could get permission to
go on the train he had in mind, he would have some
leisure hours in Detroit and would be able to spend
them at the public library free of charge. His par-
ents objected, particularly his mother, but finally he
obtained their consent.

It has been thought by many people that his
family was poor, and that it was on account of their
poverty that young Edison came to sell newspapers
on the train. This is not true, for his father was a
prosperous dealer in grain and feed, and was also
actively interested in the lumber industry and other
things. While he was not rich, he made money in
his business, and, having a well-stocked farm and a
large orchard besides, was in comfortable circum-

17

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

stances. Socially the family stood high in the town,
where at the time many well-to-do people resided.

It was of his own choice and because of his never-
satisfied desire for experiment and knowledge that
Edison became a newsboy.

In 1859, when he was twelve years old, he applied
for the privilege of selling newspapers on the trains
of the Grand Trunk Railroad between Port Huron
and Detroit. After a short delay the necessary per-
mission was obtained.

Even before this he had had some business ex-
perience. His father had laid out a ''market-gar-
den" on the farm, and young Edison, at eleven years
of age, and Michael Oates had worked in it pretty
steadily, in the season the two boys would load up
a wagon with onions, lettuce, peas, etc., and drive
through the town to sell their produce. As much
as $600 was turned over to Mrs. Edison in one
year from this source.

Edison was industrious, but he did not take kindly
to farming. He tells us about this himself:

"After a while I tired of this work. Hoeing corn
in a hot sun is unattractive, and I did not wonder
that boys had left the farm for the city. Soon the
Grand Trunk Railroad was extended from Toronto
to Port Huron, at the foot of Lake Huron, and
thence to Detroit, at about the same time the War
of the Rebellion broke out. By a great amount of
persistence I got permission from my mother to
go on the local train as newsboy. The local train
from Port Huron to Detroit, a distance of sixty-
three miles, left at 7 a.m. and arrived again at

18

EDISON'S EARLY BOYHOOD

9.30 P.M. After being on the train for several
months, I started two stores at Port Huron — one for
periodicals and the other for vegetables, butter, and
berries in the season. These were attended by two
boys, who shared in the profits. The periodical store
I soon closed, as the boy in charge could not be
trusted. The vegetable store I kept up for nearly a
year. After the railroad had been opened a short
time they put on an express, which left Detroit in
the morning and returned in the evening. I re-
ceived permission to put a newsboy on this train.
Connected with this train was a car, one part for
baggage and the other part for United States mail,
but for a long time it was not used. Every morning
I had two large baskets of vegetables from the
Detroit market loaded in the mail car and sent to
Port Huron, when the boy would take them to the
store. They were much better than those grown
locally, and sold readily. I never was asked for
freight, and to this day cannot explain why, except
that I was so small and industrious and the nerve to
appropriate a United States mail car to do a free
freight business was so monumental. However, I
kept this up for a long time, and in addition bought
butter from the farmers along the line and an im-
mense amount of blackberries in the season. I
bought wholesale and at a low price, and permitted
the wives of the engineers and trainmen to have the
benefit of the discount. After a while there was a
daily immigrant train put on. This train generally
had from seven to ten coaches, filled always with
Norwegians, all bound for Iowa and Minnesota. On

19

/

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

these trains I employed a boy who sold bread, to-
bacco, and stick candy. As the war progressed the
daily newspaper sales became very profitable, and I
gave up the vegetable store."

This shrewd commercial instinct, and the capacity
for carrying on successfully several business under-
takings at the same time, were certainly remarkable
in a boy only thirteen years old. And now, having
had a glimpse of Edison^s very early youth, let us
begin a new chapter and follow his further adven-
tures as a newsboy on a railway train.

20

IV

THE YOUNG NEWSBOY

Edison's train left Port Huron at seven o'clock
in the morning and arrived at Detroit in about
three hours. It did not leave Detroit again until
quite late in the afternoon, arriving at Port Huron
about nine-thirty at night. This made a long day
for the boy, but it gave him an opportunity to do
just what he wanted, which was to read, to buy
chemicals and apparatus, and to indulge in his fa-
vorite occupation — chemical experimentation.

The train was made up of three coaches — bag-
gage, smoking, and ordinary passenger. The bag-
gage-car was divided into three compartments — one
for trunks and packages, one for the mail, and one
for smoking.

As there was no ventilation in this smoking-
compartment, no use was made of it. It was there-
fore turned over to young Edison, who not only
kept his papers there and his stock of goods as a
''candy butcher," but he also transferred to it the
contents of the precious laboratory from his mother's
cellar. He found plenty of leisure on the two daily
runs of the train to follow up his study of chemistry.

His earnings on the train were excellent, for he
often took in eight or ten dollars a day. One dollar
a day always went to his mother, and, as he was

21

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

thus supporting himself, he felt entitled to spend
any other profit left over on chemicals and appa-
ratus. Detroit being a large city, he could obtain
a greater variety there than in his own small town.
He spent a great deal of time in reading up on his
favorite subject at the public library, where he could
find plenty of technical books. Thus he gave up
most of his time and all his money to chemistry.

He did not confine himself entirely to chemistry
in his reading at the Detroit public library, but
sought to gain knowledge on other subjects. It is
a matter of record that in the beginning of his read-
ing he started in with a certain section of the library
and tried to read it through, shelf by shelf, regard-
less of subject.

Edison went along in this manner for quite a long
time. When the Civil War broke out he noticed
that there was a much greater demand for news-
papers. He became ambitious to publish a local
journal of his own. So his little laboratory in the
smoking-compartment received some additions which
made it also a newspaper office.

He picked up a second-hand printing-press in
Detroit and bought some type. With his mechani-
cal ability, it was not a difficult matter to learn
the rudiments of the printing art, and as some of the
type was kept on the train he could set it up in
moments of leisure. Thus he became the composi-
tor, pressman, editor, proprietor, publisher, and
newsdealer of the Weekly Herald. The price was
three cents a copy, or eight cents a month for regu-
lar subscribers and the circulation ran up to over

22

THE YOUNG NEWSBOY

four hundred copies an issue. Only one or two
copies of this journal are now to be found.

It was the first newspaper in the world printed
on a train in motion. It received the patronage of
the famous English engineer, Stephenson, and was
also noted by the London Times. As the produc-
tion of a boy of fourteen it was certainly a clever
sheet, and many people were willing subscribers, for,
by the aid of the railway telegraph, Edison was
often able to print late news of local importance
which could not be found in regular papers, like
those of Detroit.

Edison's business grew so large that he employed
a boy friend to help him. There was often plenty
of work for both in the early days of the war, when
the news of battle caused great excitement.

In order to increase the sales of newspapers,
Edison would telegraph the news ahead to the agents
of stations where the train stopped and get them to
put up bulletins, so that, when the stations were
reached, there would usually be plenty of purchasers
waiting.

He recalls in particular the sensation caused by the
great battle of Shiloh, or Pittsburg Landing, in
April, 1862, in which both Grant and Sherman were
engaged, in which the Confederate General John-
ston was killed, and in which there was a great
number of men killed and wounded.

The bulletin-boards of the Detroit newspapers
were surrounded by dense crowds, which read that
there were about sixty thousand killed and wounded,

23

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

and that the result was uncertain. Edison, in relat-
ing his experience of that day, says:

"I knew if the same excitement was shown at the
various small towns along the road, and especially
at Port Huron, the sale of papers would be great. I
then conceived the idea of telegraphing the news
ahead, went to the operator in the depot, and, on
my giving him Harper's Weekly and some other
papers for three months, he agreed to telegraph to
all the stations the matter on the bulletin-board. I
hurriedly copied it, and he sent it, requesting the
agents to display it on the blackboards used for stat-
ing the arrival and departure of trains. I decided
that, instead of the usual one hundred papers, I could
sell one thousand; but not having sufficient money
to purchase that number, I determined in my des-
peration to see the editor himself and get credit.
The great paper at that time was the Detroit Free
Press. I walked into the office marked 'Editorial'
and told a young man that I wanted to see the editor
on important business — important to me, an3rway.

"I was taken into an office where there were two
men, and I stated what I had done about telegraph-
ing, and that I wanted a thousand papers, but only
had money for three hundred, and I v/anted credit.
One of the men refused it, but the other told the
first spokesman to let me have them. This man, I
afterward learned, was Wilbur F. Storey, who sub-
sequently founded the Chicago Times and became
celebrated in the newspaper world. With the aid
of another boy I lugged the papers to the train and
started folding them. The first station, called Utica,

24

THE YOUNG NEWSBOY

was a small one, where I generally sold two papers.
I saw a crowd ahead on the platform, and thought
it was some excursion, but the moment I landed
there was a rush for me; then I realized that the
telegraph was a great invention. I sold thirty-five
papers there. The next station was Mount Clemens,
now a watering-place, but then a town of about one
thousand population. I usually sold six to eight
papers there. I decided that if I found a correspond-
ing crowd there the only thing to do to correct my
lack of judgment in not getting more papers was
to raise the price from five cents to ten. The crowd
was there, and I raised the price. At the various
towns there were corresponding crowds. It had
been my practice at Port Huron to jump from the
train at a point about one-fourth of a mile from the
station, where the train generally slackened speed. I
had drawn several loads of sand to this point to
jump on, and had become quite expert. The little
Dutch boy with the horse met me at this point.
When the wagon approached the outskirts of the
town I was met by a large crowd. I then yelled:
*Twenty-five cents apiece, gentlemen! I haven't
enough to go around!' I sold out, and made what
to me then was an immense sum of money."

But this and similar gains of money did not
increase Edison's savings, for all his spare cash
was spent for new chemicals and apparatus. He
had bought a copy of Fresenius's Qualitative Analy-
sis, and, with his ceaseless testing and study of its
advanced problems, his little laboratory on the train
was now becoming crowded with additional equip-

25

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

ment, especially as he now added electricity to his
studies.

"While a newsboy on the railroad," says Edison,
"I got very much interested in electricity, probably
from visiting telegraph offices with a chum who had
tastes similar to mine."

We have already seen that he was shrewd enough
to use the telegraph to get news items for his own
little journal and also to bulletin his special news of
the Civil War along the line. To such a ceaseless
experimenter as he was, it was only natural that
electricity should come in for a share of his atten-
tion. With his knowledge of chemistry, he had no
trouble in "setting up" batteries, but his difficulty lay
in obtaining instruments and material for circuits.

To-day any youth who desires to experiment with
telegraphy or telephony can find plenty of stores
where apparatus can be bought ready made, or he
can make many things himself by following the in-
structions in Harper s Electricity Book for Boys.
But in Edison's boyish days it was quite different.
Telegraph supplies were hard to obtain, and ama-
teurs were usually obliged to make their own
apparatus.

However, he and his chum had a line between
their homes, built of common stove-pipe wire. The
insulators were bottles set on nails driven into trees
and short poles. The magnet wire was wound with
rags for insulation, and pieces of spring brass were
used for telegraph keys.

With the idea of securing current cheaply, Edi-
son applied the little he knew about static electricity,

26

EDISON WHEN ABOUT FOURTEEN OR FIFTEEN YEARS OF AGE

THE YOUNG NEWSBOY

and actually experimented with cats. He treated
them vigorously as frictional machines until the
animals fled in dismay, leaving their marks to re-
mind the young inventor of his first great lesson in
the relative value of sources of electrical energy.
Resorting to batteries, however, the line was made
to work, and the two boys exchanged messages.

Edison wanted lots of practice, and secured it in
an ingenious manner. H he could have had his
way he would have sat up until the small hours of
the morning, but his father insisted on eleven-thirty
as the proper bed-time, which left but a short interval
after a long day on the train.

Now, each evening, when the boy went home with
newspapers that had not been sold, his father would
sit up to read them. So Edison on some excuse
had his friend take the papers, but suggested to his
father that he could get the news from the chum
by telegraph bit by bit. The scheme interested the
father, and was put into effect, the messages over
the wire being written down by Edison and handed
to the old gentleman to read.

This gave good practice every night until twelve
or one o'clock, and was kept up for some time, until
the father became willing that his son should sit up
for a reasonable time. The papers were then brought
home again, and the boys practised to their hearts'
content, until the line was pulled down by a stray
cow wandering through the orchard.

Now we come to the incident which may be re-
garded as turning Edison's thoughts more definitely
to electricity. One August morning, in 1862, the

27

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

mixed train on which he worked as newsboy was
doing some shunting at Mount Clemens station. A
laden box-car had been pushed out of a siding, when
Edison, who was loitering about the platform, saw
the little son of the station agent, Mr. J. U. Macken-
zie, playing with the gravel on the main track, along
which the car, without a brakeman, was rapidly
approaching.

Edison dropped his papers and his cap and made
a dash for the child, whom he picked up and lifted
to safety without a second to spare, as the wheel
struck his heel. Both were cut about the face and
hands by the gravel ballast on which they fell.

The two boys were picked up by the train-hands
and carried to the platform, and the grateful father,
who knew and liked the rescuer, offered to teach
him the art of train telegraphy and to make an opera-
tor of him. It is needless to say that the proposal
was most eagerly accepted.

Edison found time for his new studies by letting
one of his friends look after the newsboy work on
the train for part of the trip, keeping for himself
the run between Port Huron and Mount Clemens.
We have already seen that he was qualified as a
beginner, and, besides, he was able to take to the
station a neat little set of instruments he had just
finished at a gun shop in Detroit.

What with his business as newsboy, his publi-
cation of the Weekly Herald, his reading and chemi-
cal and electrical experiments, Edison was leading a
busy life and making rapid progress, but unexpect-
edly there came disaster, which brought about a

28

THE YOUNG NEWSBOY

sudden change. One day, as the train was running
swiftly over a piece of poorly laid track, there was a
sudden lurch, and a stick of phosphorus was jarred
from its shelf, fell to the floor and burst into flame.

The car took fire, and Edison was trying in vain
to put out the blaze when the conductor rushed
in with water and saved the car. On arriving at
the next station the enraged conductor put the boy
off with his entire outfit, including his laboratory
and printing-plant.

The origin of Edison's deafness may be told in
his own words : *'My train was standing by the plat-
form at Smith's Creek station. I was trying to
climb into the freight car with both arms full of
papers when the conductor took me by the ears and
lifted me. I felt something snap inside my head,
and my deafness started from that time and has
ever since progressed."

*This deafness has been a great advantage to me
in various ways. When in a telegraph oflice I could
hear only the instrument directly on the table at which
I sat, and, unlike the other operators, I was not
bothered by the other instruments. Again, in experi-
menting on the telephone, I had to improve the trans-
mitter so that I could hear it. This made the
telephone commercial, as the magneto telephone re-
ceiver of Bell was too weak to be used as a trans-
mitter commercially. It was the same with the
phonograph. The great defect of that instrument
was the rendering of the overtones in music and
the hissing consonants in speech. I worked over
one year, twenty hours a day, Sundays and all, to get

29

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

the word "specie" perfectly recorded and reproduced
on the phonograph. When this was done I knew
that everything else could be done — ^which was a
fact. Again, my nerves have been preserved intact.
Broadway is as quiet to me as a country village is
to a person with normal hearing."

But we left young Edison on the station platform,
sorrowful and indignant, as the train moved off,
deserting him in the midst of his beloved possessions.
He was saddened, but not altogether discouraged,
and after some trouble succeeded in making his way
home, where he again set up his laboratory and also
his printing-office. There was some objection on
the part of the family, as they feared that they might
also suffer from fire, but he promised not to bring in
anything of a dangerous nature.

He continued to publish the Weekly Herald, but
after a while was persuaded by a chum to change
its character and publish it under the name of Paul
Pry, making it a journal of town gossip about local
people and their affairs and peculiarities.

No copies of Paul Pry can now be found, but it
is known that its style was distinctly personal, and
the weaknesses of the townspeople were discussed in
it very freely and frankly by the two boys. It caused
no small offense, and in one instance Edison was
pitched into the St. Clair River by one of the vic-
tims whose affairs had been given such unsought
publicity.

Possibly this was one of the reasons that caused
Edison to give up the paper not very long afterward.
He had a great liking for newspaper work, and

30

THE YOUNG NEWSBOY

might have continued in that field had it not been
for strong influences in other directions. There is
no question, however, that he was the youngest pub-
lisher and editor of his time.

31

A FEW STORIES OF EDISON's NEWSBOY DAYS

THE Grand Trunk Railroad machine shops at
Port Huron had a great attraction for young
Edison. The boy who was to have much to do with
the evolution of the modern electric locomotive in
later years was fascinated with the mechanism of the
steam locomotive. Whenever he could get the chance
he would ride with the engineer in the cab, and
he liked nothing better than to handle the locomotive
himself during the run. Edison's own account of
what happened on of these trips is very laughable.
He says :

"The engine was one of a number leased to the
Grank Trunk by the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy.
It had bright brass bands all over the woodwork,
was beautifully painted, and everything was highly
polished, which was the custom up to the time old
Commodore Vanderbilt stopped it on his roads. It
was a slow freight train. The engineer and fire-
man had been out all night at a dance. After run-
ning about fifteen miles they became so sleepy that
they couldn't keep their eyes open, and agreed to
permit me to run the engine. I took charge, reduc-
ing the speed to about twelve miles an hour, and
brought the train of seven cars to her destination at
the Grand Trunk junction safely. But something

32

EDISON'S NEWSBOY DAYS

occurred which was very much out of the ordinary.
I was greatly worried about the water, and I knew
that if it got low the boiler was likely to explode.
I hadn't gone twenty miles before black, damp mud
blew out of the stack and covered every part of the
engine, including myself. I was about to awaken
the fireman to find out the cause of this, when it
stopped. Then I approached a station where the
fireman always went out to the cow-catcher, opened
the oil-cup on the steam-chest, and poured oil in.
I started to carry out the procedure, when, upon
opening the oil-cup, the steam rushed out with a
tremendous noise, nearly knocking me off the engine.
I succeeded in closing the oil-cup and got back in
the cab, and made up my mind that she would pull
through without oil. I learned afterward that the
engineer always shut ofiF steam when the fireman
went to oil. This point I failed to notice. My pow-
ers of observation were very much improved after
this occurrence. Just before I reached the junction
another outpour of black mud occurred, and the
whole engine was a sight — so much so that when
I pulled into the yard everybody turned to see it,
laughing immoderately. I found the reason of the
mud was that I carried so much water it passed over
into the stack, and this washed out all the accumu-
lated soot."

One afternoon, about a week before Christmas,
the train on which Edison was a newsboy jumped
the track. Four old cars with rotten sills went all
to pieces, distributing figs, raisins, dates, and candies
all over the track. Hating to see so much waste, the

33

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

boy tried to save all he could by eating it on the
spot, but, as a result, he says, "our family doctor had
the time of his Ufe with me."

Another incident, which shows free and easy rail-
roading and Southern extravagance, is related by
Edison, as follows :

"In i860, just before the war broke out, there
came to the train one afternoon in Detroit two fine-
looking young men, accompanied by a colored ser-
vant. They bought tickets for Port Huron, the
terminal point for the train. After leaving the
junction just outside of Detroit, I brought in the
evening papers. When I came opposite the two
young men, one of them said, *Boy, what have you
got?' I said, Tapers.' 'All right.' He took them
and threw them out of the window, and, turning
to the colored man, said, 'Nicodemus, pay this boy.'
I told Nicodemus the am.ount, and he opened a
satchel and paid me. The passengers didn't know
what to make of the transaction. I returned with
the illustrated papers and magazines. These were
seized and thrown out of the window, and I was
told to get my money of Nicodemus. I then re-
turned with all the old magazines and novels I had
not been able to sell, thinking perhaps this would
be too much for them. I was small and thin, and
the layer reached above my head, and was all I could
possibly carry. I had prepared a list, and knew the
amount in case they bit again. When I opened the
door all the passengers roared with laughter. I
walked right up to the young men. One asked me
what I had. I said, 'Magazines and novels.' He

34

EDISON'S NEWSBOY DAYS

promptly threw them out of the window, and Nico-
demus settled. Then I came in with cracked hickory
nuts, then popcorn balls, and, finally, molasses candy.
All went out of the window. I felt like Alexander
the Great ! — I had no more chances ! I had sold all
I had. Finally I put a rope to my trunk, which was
about the size of a carpenter's chest, and started to
pull this from the baggage-car to the passenger-car.
It was almost too much for my strength, but at
last I got it in front of those men. I pulled off my
coat and hat and shoes and laid them on the chest.
Then the young man asked, 'What have you got,
boy?' I said, 'Everything, sir, that I can spare that
is for sale.' The passengers fairly jumped with
laughter. Nicodemus paid me %2y for this last sale,
and threw the whole out of the door in the rear of
the car. These men were from the South, and I
have always retained a soft spot in my heart for a
Southern gentleman."

While Edison was a newsboy on the train a re-
quest came to him one day to go to the office of
E. B. Ward & Co., at that time the largest owners
of steamboats on the Great Lakes. The captain of
their largest boat had died suddenly, and they wanted
a message taken to another captain who lived about
fourteen miles from Ridgeway station on the rail-
road. This captain had retired, taken up some lum-
ber land, and had cleared part of it. Edison was
offered fifteen dollars by Mr. Ward to go and fetch
him, but as it was a wild country and would be
dark, Edison stood out for twenty-five dollars, so
that he could get the companionship of another lad.

35

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

The terms were agreed to. Edison arrived at Ridge-
way at 8.30 P.M., when it was raining and as dark
as ink. Getting with difficulty another boy to volun-
teer, he launched out on his errand in the pitch-
black night. The two boys carried lanterns, but the
road was a rough path through dense forest. The
country was wild, and it was quite usual to see
deer, bear, and coon skins nailed up on the sides of
houses to dry. Edison had read about bears, but
couldn't remember whether they were day or night
prowlers. The farther they went, the more afraid
they became, and every stump in the forest looked
like a bear. The other lad proposed seeking safety
up a tree, but Edison objected on the plea that bears
could climb, and that the message must be delivered
that night to enable the captain to catch the morn-
ing train. First one lantern went out, then the
other. Edison says : "We leaned up against a tree
and cried. I thought if I ever got out of that scrape
alive I would know more about the habits of animals
and everything else, and be prepared for all kinds of
mischance when I again undertook an enterprise.
However, the intense darkness dilated the pupils of
our eyes so as to make them very sensitive, and we
could just see at times the outline of the road.
Finally, just as a faint gleam of daylight arrived,
we entered the captain's yard and delivered the mes-
sage. In my whole life I never spent such a night
of horror as that, but I got a good lesson."

An amusing incident of this period is told by
Edison. ''When I v/as a boy," he says, "the Prince
of Wales, the late King Edward, came to Canada

36

EDISON'S NEWSBOY DAYS

X.('^^6o), Great preparations were made at Sarnia,
the Canadian town opposite Port Huron. About
every boy, including myself, went over to see the
affair. The town was draped in flags most pro-
fusely, and carpets were laid on the cross-walks for
the Prince to walk on. There were arches, etc. A
stand was built, raised above the general level, where
the Prince was to be received by the Mayor. Seeing
all these preparations, my idea of a prince was very
high ; but when he did arrive I mistook the Duke of
Newcastle for him, the Duke being a fine-looking
man. I soon saw that I was mistaken, that the
Prince was a young stripling, and did not meet ex-
pectations. Several of us expressed our belief that
a prince wasn't much after all, and said that we
were thoroughly disappointed. For this one boy
was whipped. Soon the Canuck boys attacked the
Yankee boys, and we were all badly licked. I, my-
self, got a black eye. That has always prejudiced
me against that kind of ceremonial and folly."

Many years afterward, when Edison had won
fame by many inventions, including his electric-light
system, and had been awarded the Albert Gold
Medal by the Royal Society of Arts, it was this
same prince who wrote a graceful letter which ac-
companied the medal.

Here is another of Mr. Edison's stories:
"After selling papers in Port Huron, which was
often not reached until about nine-thirty at night,
I seldom^ got home before eleven or eleven-thirty.
About half-way home from the station and the town,
within twenty-five feet of the road, in a dense wood,

37

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

was a soldiers' graveyard, where three hundred sol-
diers were buried, due to a cholera epidemic which
took place at Fort Gratiot, near by, many years pre-
viously. At first we used to shut our eyes and run
the horse past this graveyard, and if the horse
stepped on a twig my heart would give a violent
movement, and it is a wonder that I haven't some
valvular disease of that organ. But soon this run-
ning of the horse became monotonous, and after a
while all fears of graveyards absolutely disappeared
from my system. I was in the condition of Sam
Houston, the pioneer and founder of Texas, who, it
was said, knew no fear. Houston lived some dis-
tance from the town, and generally went home late
at night, having to pass through a dark cypress
swamp over a corduroy road. One night, to test
his alleged fearlessness, a man stationed himself be-
hind a tree, and enveloped himself in a sheet. He
confronted Houston suddenly, and Sam stopped and
said: *If you are a man, you can't hurt me. If you
are a ghost, you don't want to hurt me. And if you
are the devil, come home with me; I married your
sister!'"

We have already seen that Edison was of an ex-
ceedingly studious nature and full of ambition to
work, experiment, and hustle. The serious side of
his nature did not, however, wholly prevail. He had
a keen enjoyment of a joke, even as he has now, and
in his boyhood days had no particular objection if it
took a practical form. The following, as related by
him, is one of many :

"After the breaking out of the War there was a

38

EDISON^S NEWSBOY DAYS

regiment of volunteer soldiers quartered at Fort
Gratiot, the reservation extending to the boundary
line of our house. Nearly every night we would
hear a call such as ^Corporal of the Guard No. i.*
This would be repeated from sentry to sentry, until
it reached the barracks, when Corporal of the Guard
No. I would come and see what was wanted. I and
the little Dutch boy, upon returning from the town
after selling our papers, thought we would take a
hand at military affairs. So one night, when it was
very dark, I shouted for Corporal of the Guard
No. I. The second sentry, thinking it was the
terminal sentry who shouted, repeated it to the third,
and so on. This brought the corporal along the
half mile, only to find that he was fooled. We
tried him three nights ; but the third night they were
watching, and caught the little Dutch boy, took him
to the lock-up at the fort, and shut him up. They
chased me to the house. I rushed for the cellar.
In one small compartment, where there were two
barrels of potatoes and a third one nearly empty, I
poured these remnants into the other barrels, sat
down, and pulled the empty barrel over my head,
bottom up. The soldiers had awakened my father,
and they were searching for me with candles and
lanterns. The corporal was absolutely certain I came
into the cellar, and couldn't see how I could have
gotten out, and wanted to know from my father
if there was no secret hiding-place. On assurance
of my father, who said that there was not, he said
it was most extraordinary. I was glad when they
left, as I was cramped, and the potatoes that had

39

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

been in the barrel were rotten and violently offen-
sive. The next morning I was found in bed, and
received a good switching on the legs from my
father, the first and only one I ever received from
him, although my mother kept behind the old Seth
Thomas clock a switch that had the bark worn off.
My mother's ideas and mine differed at times, espe-
cially when I got experimenting and mussed up
things. The Dutch boy was released next morning."

It may have seemed strange to you, on reading
this and the previous chapter, that a lad so young
as Edison was during the newsboy period — from
about twelve to fifteen years of age — should have
been allowed such wide liberty. An extensive trav-
eler for those days, going early and returning late,
an experimenter in chemistry, a publisher, printer,
newsdealer, amateur locomotive engineer, and what
not, covered a large range of experience and action
for one so youthful.

To others of the family than his mother he was
accounted a strange boy, some believing him to be
mentally unbalanced. His mother, however, under-
stood that his was no ordinary mind, for she had
studied him thoroughly. While she watched him
closely, she allowed him the widest possible sphere
of action and encouraged his ever increasing studies.

A member of the family, in talking recently with
the writer, said that when any one expressed nerv-
ousness about young Edison during his absences she
would say: "Al is all right. Nothing will happen
to him. God is taking care of him."

40

VI

THE YOUNG TELEGRAPH OPERATOR

AFTER Edison's expulsion from the train with his
^ laboratory and belongings, his career as a
newsboy came to a sudden close. But, while he felt
some disappointment, he was not discouraged and
was none the less busy. As we have seen, he pub-
lished his local paper for a while and also continued
his chemical experiments at home. In addition, he
plunged deeply into the study of telegraphy under
Mr. Mackenzie's tuition.

Edison took to telegraphy enthusiastically, giving
to it no less than eighteen hours a day. After some
months he had made such progress that he put up a
telegraph line from the station to the village, about
a mile distant, and opened an office in a drug store :
but the business there was very light and the office
was not continued long.

A little later he became the regular operator at
Port Huron. The office was in the store of a Mr.
M. Walker, who sold jewelry and also newspapers
and periodicals. Edison was to be found at the
office both day and night, and slept there.

He says : ''I became quite valuable to Mr. Walker.
After working all day I worked at the office nights
as well, for the reason that 'press reports' came over
one of the wires until 3 a.m., and I would cut in

41

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

and copy it as well as I could, to become proficient
more rapidly. The goal of the rural telegraph op-
erator was to be able to take press. Mr. Walker
tried to get my father to apprentice me at twenty
dollars per month, but they could not agree. I then
applied for a job on the Grand Trunk Railroad as a
railway operator, and was given a place, nights, at
Stratford Junction, Canada."

Many years afterward Mr. Walker described the
boy of sixteen as engrossed intensely in his experi-
ments and scientific reading. The telegraph office
was not a busy one, but sometimes messages taken
in would remain unsent while Edison was in the
cellar busy on some chemical problem.

He would be seen at times reading a scientific
paper and then disappearing to buy a few sundries
for experiments. Returning from the drug store
with his chemicals, he would not be seen again until
required by his duties, or until he had found out for
himself, if possible, the truth of the statement he had
been reading. If wanted for his experiment, he did
not hesitate to make free use of the watchmaker's
tools that lay on the table in the front window.
His one idea was to do quickly when he wanted to
do; and this tendency is still one of his marked
characteristics.

The telegrapher's position at Stratford Junction,
Canada, was taken by Edison in 1863, when he was
sixteen years old, and paid him twenty-five dollars
per month. In speaking of it he has since remarked
that there was little difference between the tele-
graph of that time and that of to-day. He says :

42

THE YOUNG OPERATOR

"The telegraph men couldn't explain how it worked,
and I was always trying to get them to do so. I
think they couldn't. I remember the best explana-
tion I got was from an old Scotch line repairer
employed by the Montreal Telegraph Company,
which operated the railroad wires. He said that if
you had a dog like a dachshund, long enough to
reach from Edinburgh to London, if you pulled his
tail in Edinburgh he would bark in London. I
could understand that, but I never could get it
through me what went through the dog or over
the wire."

Edison was ever keenly anxious to add to his stock
of experimental apparatus, as an incident of this
period shows : ''While working at Stratford Junc-
tion," he says, *'I was told by one of the freight
conductors that in the freight-house at Goodrich
there were several boxes of old broken-up batteries.
I went there and found over eighty cells of the well-
known Grove nitric-acid battery. The operator
there, who was also agent, when asked by me if I
could have the electrodes of each cell, which were
made of sheet platinum, gave his permission readily,
thinking they were of tin. I removed them all, and
they amounted to several ounces in weight. Plat-
inum even in those days was very expensive, costing
several dollars an ounce, and I owned only three
small strips. I was overjoyed at this acquisition,
and those very strips and the reworked scrap are
used to this day in my laboratory, over forty years
later."

It was while he was employed as a night operator

43

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

at Stratford Junction that Edison's inventiveness
was first displayed. In order to make sure that the
operators were not asleep they were required to
send the signal ''6" to the train despatcher's office
every hour during the night. Now, Edison spent
all day in study and experiment, but he needed sleep,
just as any healthy youth does, and so he made a
small wheel with notches on the rim and attached it
to the clock and line. At night he connected it with
the circuit, and at each hour the wheel revolved and
automatically sent in the dots required for ''sixing."

The invention was a success, but the train des-
patcher soon noticed that frequently, in spite of the
regularity of the report, Edison's office could not
be raised even if a message were sent immediately
after. An investigation followed, which revealed
this ingenious device, and he received a reprimand.

A serious occurrence that might have resulted in
accident drove him soon after from Canada, al-
though the youth could hardly be held to blame for
it. Edison says : *This night job just suited me, as
I could have the whole day to myself. I had the
faculty of sleeping in a chair any time for a few
minutes at a time. I taught the night yardman my
call, so I could get half an hour's sleep now and then
between trains, and in case the station was called
the watchman would awaken me. One night I got
an order to hold a freight train, and I replied that I
would. I rushed out to find the signalman, but
before I could find him and get the signal set the
train ran past. I ran to the telegraph office, and
reported that I could not hold her. The train des-

44

THE YOUNG OPERATOR

patcher, on the strength of my message that I
would hold the train, had permitted another to leave
the last station in the opposite direction. There
was a lower station near the junction, where the
day operator slept. I started for it on foot. The
night was dark, and I fell into a culvert and was
knocked senseless."

Fortunately, the two engineers saw each other ap-
proaching and stopped in time to prevent an acci-
dent. Edison, however, was summoned to the
general manager's office to be tried for neglect of
duty. During the trial two Englishmen called, and
while they were talking with the manager the youth-
ful operator slipped out, jumped on a freight train
going to Sarnia, and was not happy until the ferry-
boat from Sarnia had landed him safe on the Mich-
igan shore.

The same winter, of 1863-64, while at Port
Huron, Edison had a further opportunity of show-
ing his ingenuity. An ice- jam had broken the
telegraph cable laid in the bed of the river across to
Sarnia, and communication was interrupted. The
river is three-quarters of a mile wide, and could not
be crossed on foot, nor could the cable be repaired.

Edison suggested using the steam whistle of a
locomotive to give the long and short signals of
the Morse code. An operator on the Sarnia shore
was quick enough to understand the meaning of the
strange whistling, and thus messages were sent in
wireless fashion across the ice-floes in the river.

Young Edison had no inclination to return to
Canada after his late experience there. He decided,

45

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

however, that he would stick to telegraphy as a busi-
ness, and, after a short stay at home in Port Huron,
set out to find work as an operator in another city.
And thus he commenced the roaming and drifting
life which in the next five years took him all over
the Middle States.

At this time the Civil War was in progress, and
many hundreds of skilled operators were at the front
with the army, engaged exclusively in government
service. Consequently there was a great scarcity of
telegraphers throughout all the cities and towns of
the country. For this reason it was not difficult for
an operator to get work wherever he might go. Thus
one might gratify a desire to travel and get experi-
ence without running much risk of privation.

There were a great many others besides Edison
who wandered about from city to city, working
awhile in one place and drifting to another. As a
rule, they were bright, happy-go-lucky fellows, full
of the spirit of good comradeship, and willing to
share bed, board, and pocket-money with those who
might temporarily be less fortunate than themselves.

Many of them used telgraphy as a stepping-stone
to better themselves in life, while others, unfortu-
nately, became dissipated, and, becoming unreliable
through drink, could not hold a position for long.
Had Edison been by nature less persistent and in-
dustrious than he was, this miscellaneous companion-
ship might have tended to wreck his career, but all
through his life, from boyhood, he has been particu-
larly abstemious and has had a contempt for the

46

THE YOUNG OPERATOR

wastefulness of time, money, and health entailed by
the drink habit.

Throughout this period of his life Edison, al-
though wandering from place to place, never ceased
to study, explore, and experiment. Referring to this
beginning of his career, he mentions a curious fact
that throws light on his ceaseless application. ''After
I became a telegraph operator," he says, 'T prac-
tised for a long time to become a rapid reader of
print, and got so expert I could sense the meaning
of a whole line at once. This faculty, I believe,
should be taught in schools, as it appears to be
easily acquired. Then one can read two or three
books in a day, whereas if each word at a time only
is sensed reading is laborious."

During this wandering period of his life Edison
made many friends, one of the earliest of whom was
Milton F. Adams, who had a strange career. Of
him Edison says : "Adams was one of a class of
operators never satisfied to work at any place for
any great length of time. He had the 'wanderlust.'
After enjoying hospitality in Boston in 1868-69, on
the floor of my hall bedroom, which was a paradise
for the entomologist, while the boarding-house itself
was run on the Banting system of flesh reduction,
he came to me one day and said : 'Good-by, Edison,
I have got sixty cents, and I am going to San Fran-
cisco.' And he did go. How, I never knew per-
sonally. I learned afterward that he got a job there,
and then within a week they had a telegraphers'
strike. He got a big torch and sold patent medicine
on the streets at night to support the strikers. Then

47

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

he went to Peru as partner of a man who had a
grizzly bear which they proposed entering against a
bull in the bull-ring in that city. The grizzly was
killed in five minutes, and so the scheme died. Then
Adams crossed the Andes, and started a market re-
port bureau in Buenos Ayres. This didn't pay, so
he started a restaurant in Pernambuco, Brazil.
There he did very well, but something went wrong
(as it always does to a nomad), so he went to the
Transvaal, and ran a panorama called 'Paradise
Lost' in the Kaffir kraals. This didn't pay, and he
became the editor of a newspaper ; then he went to
England to raise money for a railroad in Cape
Colony. Next I heard of him in New York, having
just arrived from Bogota, United States of Colum-
bia, with a power of attorney and two thousand
dollars from a native of that republic, who applied
for a patent for tightening a belt to prevent it from
slipping on a pulley — a device which he thought a
new and great invention, but which was in use ever
since machinery was invented. I gave Adams then
a position as salesman for electrical apparatus. This
he soon got tired of, and I lost sight of him.'*

48

VII

ADVENTURES OF A TELEGRAPH OPERATOR

THE first position that Edison took after leaving
Canada so hurriedly was at Adrian, Michigan,
and of what happened there he tells a story typical
of his wanderings for several years to come.

"After leaving my first job at Stratford Junction
I got a position as operator on the Lake Shore &
Michigan Southern at Adrian, Michigan, in the divi-
sion superintendent's office. As usual, I took the
'night trick,' which most operators disliked, but
which I preferred, as it gave me more leisure to
experiment. I had obtained from the station agent
a small room, and had established a little shop of
my own. One day the day operator wanted to get
off, and I was on duty. About nine o'clock the
superintendent handed me a despatch which he said
was very important, and which I must get off at
once. The wire at the time was very busy, and I
asked if I should break in. I got orders to do so,
and, acting under those orders of the superintendent,
I broke in and tried to send the despatch; but the
other operator would not permit it, and the struggle
continued for ten minutes. Finally I got possession
of the wire and sent the message. The superinten-
dent of telegraph, who then lived in Adrian and
went to his office in Toledo every day, happened that

49

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

day to be in the Western Union office up-town —
and it was the superintendent I was really struggling
with! In about twenty minutes he arrived, livid
with rage, and I was discharged on the spot. I in-
formed him that the general superintendent had told
me to break in and send the despatch, but the gen-
eral superintendent then and there repudiated the
whole thing. Their families were socially close, so
I was sacrificed. My faith in human nature got a
slight jar."

From Adrian Edison went to Toledo, Ohio, and
secured a position at Fort Wayne, on the Pittsburg,
Fort Wayne & Chicago Railroad. This was a ''day
job," and he did not like it. Two months later he
drifted to Indianapolis, arriving there in the fall of
1864, when for the first time he entered the employ
of the Western Union Telegraph Company, with
which in later years he entered into closer relation-
ship. At this time, however, he was assigned to duty
at Union Station, at a salary of seventy-five dollars
a month.

He did not stay long in Indianapolis, however,
leaving in February, 1865, and going from there
to Cincinnati. This change was possibly caused by
one of his early inventions, which has been spoken
of by an expert as probably the most simple and
ingenious arrangement of connections for a repeater.

His ambition was to take "press report," which
would come over the wire quite fast, but finding
even after considerable practice, that he "broke" fre-
quently, he adjusted two embossing Morse registers
' — one to receive the press matter and the other to

50

ADVENTURES

repeat the dots and dashes at a lower speed, so that
the message could be copied leisurely. Hence, he
could not be rushed or "broken" in receiving, while
he could turn out copy that was a marvel of neatness
and clearness. This went well under ordinary condi-
tions, but when an unusual pressure occurred he fell
behind, and the newspapers complained of the slow-
ness with which the reports were delivered to them.
As to this device, Mr. Edison said recently: "To-
gether we took press for several nights, my compan-
ion keeping the apparatus in adjustment and I copy-
ing. The regular press operator would go to the
theater or take a nap, only finishing the report after
I A.M. One of the newspapers complained of bad
copy toward the end of the report — that is, from
I to 3 A.M. — and requested that the operators tak-
ing the report up to i a.m., which were ourselves,
take it all, as the copy then was perfectly unobjec-
tionable. This led to an investigation by the man-
ager, and the scheme was forbidden.

"This instrument many years afterward was ap-
plied by me to transferring messages from one wire
to any other wire simultaneously or after any inter-
val of time. It consisted of a disk of paper, the
indentations being formed in a volute spiral, exactly
as in the disk phonograph to-day. It was this instru-
ment which gave me the idea of the phonograph
while working on the telephone."

Arriving in Cincinnati, Edison got employment
in the Western Union Commercial Telegraph De-
partment at sixty dollars per month. Here he made
the acquaintance of Milton F. Adams, referred to

51

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

in the preceding chapter. Speaking of that time,
Mr. Adams says :

''I can well recall when Edison drifted in to take
a job. He was a youth of about eighteen years, de-
cidedly unprepossessing in dress and rather uncouth
in manner. I was twenty-one, and very dudish.
He was quite thin in those days, and his nose was
very prominent, giving a Napoleonic look to his
face, although the curious resemblance did not strike
me at the time. The boys did not take to him
cheerfully, and he was lonesome. I sympathized
with him, and we became close companions. As an
operator he had no superiors, and very few equals.
Most of the time he was 'monkeying' with the bat-
teries and circuits, and devising things to make the
work of telegraphy less irksome. He also relieved
the monotony of office work by fitting up the battery
circuits to play jokes on his fellow-operators, and
to deal with the vermin that infested the premises.
He arranged in the cellar what he called his 'rat
paralyzer,' a very simple contrivance, consisting of
two plates insulated from each other and connected
with the main battery. They were so placed that
when a rat passed over them the fore feet on the one
plate and the hind feet on the other completed the
circuit, and the rat departed this life, electrocuted."

Shortly after Edison's arrival in Cincinnati came
the close of the Civil War and the assassination of
President Lincoln. One of Edison's reminiscences
is interesting as showing the mechanical way in
which some telegraph operators do their work. "I
noticed," he says, "an immense crowd gathering in

52

ADVENTURES

the street outside a newspaper office. I called the
attention of the other operators to the crowd, and
we sent a messenger boy to find the cause of the
excitement. He returned in a few minutes and
shouted, 'Lincoln's shot!' Instinctively the opera-
tors looked from one face to another to see which
man had received the news. All the faces were
blank, and every man said he had not taken a word
about the shooting. 'Look over your files,' said
the boss to the man handling the press stuff. For
a few moments we waited in suspense, and then the
man held up a sheet of paper containing a short ac-
count of the shooting of the President. The operator
had worked so mechanically that he had handled the
news without the slightest realization of its sig-
nificance."

Edison's diversions in Cincinnati were character-
istic of his life before and since. He read a great
deal, but spent most of his leisure time experiment-
ing. Occasionally he would indulge in some form
of amusement, but this was not often. At this
time he and Adams were close friends, and Mr.
Adams remarks: "Edison and I were fond of
tragedy. Forrest and John McCullough were play-
ing at the National Theater, and when our capital
was sufficient we would go to see those eminent
tragedians alternate in Othello and lago. Edison
always enjoyed Othello greatly. Aside from an oc-
casional visit to the Loewen Garten, 'over the Rhine,'
with a glass of beer and a few pretzels consumed
while listening to the excellent music of a German

53

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

band, the theater was the siim and substance of our
innocent dissipation."

While Edison was in Cincinnati there came one
day a delegation of five trade-union operators from
Cleveland to form a local branch in Cincinnati. The
occasion was one of great conviviality. Night came
and many of the operators were away. The Cleve-
land wire was in special need, and Edison, almost
alone in the office, devoted himself to it all through
the night and until three o'clock next morning, when
he was relieved. He had been previously getting
eighty dollars a month, and added to this by copy-
ing plays for a theater.

His rating was that of a *'plug," or inferior oper-
ator, but having determined to become a first-class
operator, he had kept up a practice of going to the
office at night to take ''press," acting willingly as a
substitute for any operator who wanted to get off
for a few hours — which often meant all night.

Thus he had been unconsciously preparing for
the special ordeal which the conviviality of the trade-
unionists had brought about.

Speaking of that night's work, Edison says : "My
copy looked fine if viewed as a whole, as I could
write a perfectly straight line across the wide sheet,
which was not ruled. There were no flourishes, but
the individual letters would not bear close inspec-
tion. When I missed understanding a word there
was no time to think what it was, so I made an
illegible one to fill in, trusting to the printers to
sense it. I knew they could read anything, although
Mr. Bloss, an editor of the Inquirer, made such bad

54

ADVENTURES

copy that one of his editorials was pasted up on the
notice board in the telegraph office with an offer of
one dollar to any man who could Vead twenty con-
secutive words.' Nobody ever did it. When I got
through I was too nervous to go home, and so I
waited the rest of the night for the day manager,
Mr. Stevens, to see what was to be the outcome of
this union formation and of my efforts. He was
an austere man, and I was afraid of him. I got
the morning papers, which came out at 4 a.m., and
the press report read perfectly, which surprised me
greatly. I went to work on my regular day wire to
Portsmouth, Ohio, and there was considerable ex-
citement, but nothing was said to me, neither did
Mr. Stevens examine the copy on the office hook,
which I was watching with great interest. How-
ever, about 3 P.M. he went to the hook, grabbed the
bunch and looked at it as a whole without examining
it in detail, for which I was thankful. Then he
jabbed it back on the hook, and I knew I was all
right. He walked over to me, and said: 'Young
man, I want you to work the Louisville wire nights ;
your salary will be one hundred and twenty-five dol-
lars.' Thus I got from the plug classification to
that of a 'first-class man.' "

Not long after this promotion was secured Edison
started again on his wanderings. He went south,
while his friend Adams went north, neither one hav-
ing any difficulty in making the trip. He says :
''The boys in those days had extraordinary facilities
for travel. As a usual thing it was only necessary
for them to board a train and tell the conductor

55

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

they were operators. Then they could go as far as
they hked. The number of operators was small, and
they were in demand everywhere."

Edison's next stopping place was Memphis, Ten-
nessee, where he got a position as operator. Here
again he began to invent and improve on existing
apparatus, with the result of being obliged once more
to ''move on." He tells the story as follows: *T
was not the inventor of the auto-repeater, but while
in Memphis I worked on one. Learning that the
chief operator, who was a protege of the superin-
tendent, was trying in some way to put New York
and New Orleans together for the first time since
the close of the war, I redoubled my efforts, and at
two o'clock one morning I had them speaking to
each other. The office of the Memphis Avalanche
was in the same building. The paper got wind of
it and sent messages. A column came out in the
morning about it; but when I went to the office in
the afternoon to report for duty I was discharged
without explanation. The superintendent would not
even give me a pass to Nashville, so I had to pay
my fare. I had so little m.oney left that I nearly
starved at Decatur, Alabama, and had to stay three
days before going on north to Nashville. Arrived
in that city, I went to the telegraph office, got money
enough to buy a little solid food, and secured a pass
to Louisville. I had a companion with me who was
also out of a job. I arrived at Louisville on a
bitterly cold day, with ice in the gutters. I was
wearing a linen duster and was not much to look
at, but got a position at once, working on a press

56

ADVENTURES

wire. My traveling companion was less successful
on account of his 'record/ They had a limit even
in those days when the telegraph service was so
demoralized/'

After the Civil War was over the telegraph service
was in desperate condition, and some of Mr. Edi-
son's reminiscences of these times are quite interest-
ing. He says : "The telegraph was still under
military control, not having been turned over to the
original owners, the Southern Telegraph Company.
In addition to the regular force, there was an extra
force of two or three operators, and some stranded
ones, who were a burden to us, for board was high.
One of these derelicts was a great source of worry
to me personally. He would come in at all hours
and either throw ink around or make a lot of noise.
One night he built a fire in the grate and started to
throw pistol cartridges into the flames. These would
explode, and I was twice hit by the bullets, which
left a black-and-blue mark. Another night he came
in and got from some part of the building a lot
of stationery with * Confederate States' printed at
the head. He was a fine operator, and wrote a
beautiful hand. He would take a sheet of paper,
write capital *A,' and then take another sheet and
make the *A' differently; and so on through the
alphabet, each time crumpling the paper up in his
hand and throwing it on the floor. He would keep
this up until the room was filled nearly flush with
the table. Then he would quit.

"Everything at that time was Vide open.' Dis-
organization reigned supreme. There was no head

57

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

to anything. At night myself and a companion
would go over to a gorgeously furnished faro-bank
and get our midnight lunch. Everything was free.
There were over twenty keno-rooms running. One
of them that I visited was in a Baptist church, the
man with the wheel being in the pulpit and the
gamblers in the pews.

'While there, the manager of the telegraph office
was arrested for something I never understood, and
incarcerated in a military prison about half a mile
from the office. The building was in plain sight
from the office and four stories high. He was kept
strictly incommunicado. One day, thinking he might
be confined in a room facing the office, I put my arm
out of the window and kept signaling dots and
dashes by the movement of the arm. I tried this
several times for two days. Finally he noticed it,
and, putting his arm through the bars of the win-
dow, he established communication with me. He
thus sent several messages to his friends, and was
afterward set free."

Another curious story told by Edison concerns a
fellow operator on night duty at Chattanooga Junc-
tion at the time he was at Memphis : "When it was
reported that Hood was marching on Nashville, one
night a Jew came into the office about eleven o'clock
in great excitement, having heard the Hood rumor.
He, being a large sutler, wanted to send a message
to save his goods. The operator said it was impossi-
ble— that orders had been given to send no private
messages. Then the Jew wanted to bribe my friend,
who steadfastly refused, for the reason, as he told

58

ADVENTURES

the Jew, that he might be court-martialed and shot.
Finally the Jew got up to eight hundred dollars.
The operator swore him to secrecy and sent the mes-
sage. Now, there was no such order about private
messages, and the Jew, finding it out, complained to
Captain Van Duzer, chief of telegraphs, who investi-
gated the matter, and while he would not discharge
the operator, laid him off indefinitely. Van Duzer
was so lenient that if an operator was to wait three
days and then go and sit on the stoop of Van Duzer's
office all day he would be taken back. But Van
Duzer swore that if the operator had taken eight
hundred dollars and sent the message at the regular
rate, which was twenty-five cents, it would have been
all right, as the Jew would be punished for trying to
bribe a military operator; but when the operator
took the eight hundred dollars and then sent the
message deadhead he couldn't stand it, and he would
never relent."

A third typical story of this period relates to a
cipher message for General Thomas. Mr. Edison
narrates it as follows: ''When I was an operator in
Cincinnati, working the Louisville wire nights for a
time, one night a man over on the Pittsburg wire
yelled out : 'D. I. cipher,' which meant that there was
a cipher message from the War Department at
Washington, and that it was coming, and he yelled
out 'Louisville.' I started immediately to call up
that place. It was just at the change of shift in the
office. I could not get Louisville, and the cipher
message began to come. It was taken by the opera-
tor on the other table, direct from the War Depart-

59

THE BOYS^ LIFE OF EDISON

ment. It was for General Thomas, at Nashville.
I called for about twenty minutes and notified them
that I could not get Louisville. I kept at it for
about fifteen minutes longer, and notified them that
there was still no answer from Louisville. They
then notified the War Department that they could
not get Louisville. Then we tried to get it by all
kinds of roundabout ways, but in no case could
anybody get them at that office. Soon a message
came from the War Department to send imme-
diately for the manager of the Cincinnati office.
He was brought to the office and several messages
were exchanged, the contents of which, of course, I
did not know, but the matter appeared to be very
serious, as they were afraid of General Hood, of the
Confederate Army, who was then attempting to
march on Nashville; and it was important that this
cipher of about twelve hundred words or so should
be got through immediately to General Thomas. I
kept on calling up to twelve or one o'clock, but no
Louisville. About one o'clock the operator at the
Indianapolis office got hold of an operator who hap-
pened to come into his office, which had a wire which
ran from Indianapolis to Louisville along the rail-
road. He arranged with this operator to get a relay
of horses, and the message was sent through Indian-
apolis to this operator, who had engaged horses to
carry the despatches to Louisville and find out the
trouble, and get the despatches through without de-
lay to General Thomas. In those days the telegraph
fraternity was rather demoralized, and the discipline
was very lax. It was found out a couple of days

60

ADVENTURES

afterward that there were three night operators at
Louisville. One of them had gone over to Jeiferson-
ville and had fallen off a horse and broken his leg,
and was in a hospital. By a remarkable coincidence
another of the men had been stabbed in a keno-
room, and was also in a hospital, while the third
operator had gone to Cynthiana to see a man hanged
and had got left by the train."

From Memphis Edison went to Louisville. Here
he remained for about two years. It was while he
was there that he perfected the peculiar vertical style
of writing which has since been his characteristic

style. He says of this form of writing, an example
of which is given above: "I developed this style in
Louisville while taking press reports. My wire was
connected to the 'blind' side of a repeater at Cincin-
nati, so that if I missed a word or sentence, or if the

6i

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

wire worked badly, I could not break in and get
the last words, because the Cincinnati man had no
instrument by which he could hear me. I had to
take what came. When I got the job the cable across
the Ohio River at Covington, connecting with the
line to Louisville, had a variable leak in it, which
caused the strength of the signaling current to make
violent fluctuations. I obviated this by using several
relays, each with a different adjustment, working
several sounders all connected with one sounding-
plate. The clatter was bad, but I could read it with
fair ease. When, in addition to this infernal leak,
the wires north to Cleveland worked badly it re-
quired a large amount of imagination to get the
sense of what was being sent. An imagination re-
quires an appreciable time for its exercise, and as
the stuff was coming at the rate of thirty-five to
forty words a minute, it was very difficult to write
down what was coming and imagine what wasn't
coming. Hence it was necessary to become a very
rapid writer, so I started to find the fastest style.
I found that the vertical style, with each letter sepa-
rate and without any flourishes, was the most rapid,
and that, the smaller the letter, the greater the
rapidity. As I took on an average from eight to
fifteen columns of news report every day, it did not
take long to perfect this method."

The telegraph offices of those early days were
very crude as compared with the equipments of
modern times. The apparatus was generally in a
very poor condition, and the wiring was of a hap-
hazard kind. The conditions during the time of the

62

ADVENTURES

Civil War all tended to demoralization, both of
operators and apparatus.

Indeed, the following story, related by Edison,
illustrates the lengths to which telegraphers could
go at a time when they were in so much demand :
**When I took the position there was a great short-
age of operators. One night, at 2 a.m., another
operator and I were on duty. I was taking press
report, and the other man was working the New
York wire. We heard a heavy tramp, tramp, tramp
on the rickety stairs. Suddenly the door was thrown
open with great violence, dislodging it from one of
the hinges. There appeared in the doorway one of
the best operators we had, who worked daytime, and
who was of a very quiet disposition except when in-
toxicated. He was a great friend of the manager
of the office. His eyes were bloodshot and wild,
and one sleeve had been torn away from his coat.
Without noticing either of us, he went up to the
stove and kicked it over. The stovepipe fell, dis-
located at every joint. It was half full of exceed-
ingly fine soot, which floated out and completely
filled the room. This produced a momentary res-
pite to his labors. When the atmosphere had
cleared sufficiently to see he went around and pulled
every table away from the wall, piling them on top
of the stove in the middle of the room. Then he
proceeded to pull the switchboard away from the
w^all. It was held tightly by screws. He succeeded,
finally, and when it gave way he fell with the board,
and, striking on a table, cut himself so that he soon
became covered with blood. He then went to the

63

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

battery-room and knocked all the batteries off on the
floor. The nitric acid soon began to combine with
the plaster in the room below, which was the public
receiving-room for messengers and bookkeepers.
The excess acid poured through and ate up the
account-books. After having finished everything to
his satisfaction, he left. I told the other operators
to do nothing. We would leave things just as they
were, and wait until the manager came. In the
meantime, as I knew all the wires coming through
to the switchboard, I rigged up a temporary set of
instruments so that the New York business could be
cleared up, and we also got the remainder of the
press matter. At seven o'clock the day men began
to appear. They were told to go downstairs and
await the coming of the manager. At eight o'clock
he appeared, walked around, went into the battery-
room, and then came to me, saying: 'Edison, who
did this?' I told him that Billy L. had come in
full of soda-water and invented the ruin before him.
He walked back and forth about a minute, then,
coming up to my table, put his fist down, and said :
Tf Billy L. ever does that again I will discharge
him.' It was needless to say that there were other
operators who took advantage of that kind of dis-
cipline, and I had many calls at night after that, but
none with such destructive effects."

Incidents such as these, together with the daily
life and work of an operator, presented one aspect
of life to our young operator in Louisville. But
there was another, more intellectual side, in the con-
tact afforded with journalism and its leaders, on

64

ADVENTURES

which Mr. Edison looks back with great satisfac-
tion. "I remember," he says, "the discussions be-
tween the celebrated poet and journalist George
D. Prentice, then editor of the Courier- Journal, and
Mr. Tyler, of the Associated Press. I believe
Prentice was the father of the humorous paragraph
of the American newspaper. He was poetic, highly
educated, and a brilliant talker. He was very thin
and small. I do not think he weighed over one
hundred and twenty-five pounds. Tyler was a grad-
uate of Harvard, and had a very clear enunciation,
and, in sharp contrast to Prentice, he was a large
man. After the paper had gone to press Prentice
would generally come over to Tyler's office, where
I heard them arguing on the immortality of the
soul, etc. I asked permission of Mr. Tyler if, after
finishing the press matter, I might come in and
listen to the conversation, which I did many times
after. One thing I never could comprehend was
that Tyler had a sideboard with liquors and gener-
ally crackers. Prentice would pour out half a glass
of what they call corn whisky, and would dip the
crackers in it and eat them. Tyler took it sans food.
One teaspoonful of that stuff would put me to sleep."
Mr. Edison throws also a curious side-light on
the origin of the comic paragraph in the modern
American newspaper, as distributed instantly
throughout the country through the telegraph. "It
was the practice of the press operators all over the
country at that time, when a lull occurred, to start
in and send jokes or stories the day men had col-
lected; and these were copied and pasted up on the

65

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

bulletin-board. Cleveland was the originating office
for 'press,' which it received from New York and
sent out simultaneously to Milwaukee, Chicago, To-
ledo, Detroit, Pittsburg, Columbus, Dayton, Cin-
cinnati, Indianapolis, Vincennes, Terre Haute, St.
Louis and Louisville. Cleveland would call first
on Milwaukee and ask if he had anything. If so,
he would send it, and Cleveland would repeat it to
all of us. Thus any joke or story originating any-
where in that area was known the next day all over.
The press men would come in and copy anything
which could be published, which was about three per
cent. I collected, too, quite a large scrap-book of it,
but, unfortunately, I have lost it."

Edison was always a great reader, and was in the
habit of buying books at auctions and second-hand
stores. One day at an auction he bought twenty
unbound volumes of the North American Review
for two dollars. These he had bound and delivered
at the telegraph office. One morning, about three
o'clock, he started off for home at a rapid pace with
ten volumes on his shoulder. Very soon he became
conscious of the fact that bullets were flying around
him. He stopped, and a breathless policeman came
up and seized him as a suspicious character, ordering
him to drop his parcel and explain matters. Open-
ing the package, he showed the books, somewhat to
the disgust of the officer, who imagined he had
caught a burglar sneaking away with his booty.
Edison explained that, being deaf, he had heard
no challenge, and therefore had kept moving; and

66

ADVENTURES

the policeman remarked, apologetically, it was well
for Edison he was not a better shot.

Through all his travels Edison has preserved these
books, and he has them now in his library at
Llewelyn Park, Orange, New Jersey.

After two years at Louisville, Edison went back
North as far as Detroit, but soon returned to Louis-
ville. At this time there was a great deal of ex-
aggerated talk and report about the sunny life and
easy wealth of South America. This idea appealed
especially to telegraph operators, and young Edison,
with his fertile imagination, was readily inflamed
with the glowing idea of these great possibilities.

Once more he threw up his work, and, with a
couple of young friends, made his way to New
Orleans, where they expected to catch a specially
chartered steamer for Brazil.

They arrived in New Orleans just at the time of
the great riot, when the city was in the hands of a
mob. The government had seized the steamer for
carrying troops. The young men therefore visited
another shipping office to make inquiries about ves-
sels for Brazil.

Here they got into conversation with an old
Spaniard, to whom they explained their intentions.
He had lived and worked in South America, and
was very emphatic in advising them that the worst
thing they could do was to leave the United States,
whose freedom, calm, and opportunities could not
be equaled anywhere on the face of the globe. Edi-
son took the Spaniard's advice, and made his way
North again. He heard later that his two compan-

67

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

ions had gone to Vera Cruz and had died there of
yellow fever.

He returned to Louisville and resumed work
there. He seems to have been fairly comfortable
and happy at this time. He surrounded himself
with books and various apparatus, and even indited a
treatise on electricity.

It is well known that Edison is very studious
and a great reader, but his associates sometimes felt
surprised at his fund of general information. His
own words throw some light upon this subject:
"The second time I was in Louisville the Telegraph
Company had moved into a new office, and the dis-
cipline was now good. I took the press job. In fact,
I was a very poor sender, and therefore made the
taking of press report a specialty. The newspaper
men allowed me to come over, after the paper went
to press, at 3 a.m., and get all the exchanges I
wanted. These I would take home and lay at the
foot of my bed. I never slept more than four or
five hours, so that I would awake at nine or ten
and read these papers until dinner-time. I thus
kept posted, and knew from their activity every
member of Congress, and what committees they
were on, and all about the topical doings, as well as
the prices of breadstuffs in all the primary markets.
I was in a much better position than most operators
to call on my imagination to supply missing words
or sentences, which were frequent in those days of
old, rotten wires, badly insulated, especially on
stormy nights. Upon such occasions I had to supply
in some cases one-fifth of the whole matter — pure

68

ADVENTURES

guessing — ^but I got caught only once. There had
been some kind of convention in Virginia, in which
John Minor Botts was the leading figure. There
was great excitement about it, and two votes had
been taken in the convention on the two days. There
was no doubt that the vote the next day would go
a certain way. A very bad storm came up about
ten o'clock, and my wire worked badly, and there
was a cessation of all signals; then I made out the
words 'Minor Botts.' The next was a New York
item. I filled in a paragraph about the convention
and how the vote had gone as I was sure it would
go. But next day I learned that, instead of there
being a vote, the convention had adjourned without
action until the day after."

The insatiable thirst for knowledge beyond known
facts again proved Edison's undoing. Operators
were strictly forbidden to remove instruments or to
use batteries except on extra work. This rule did
not mean much to Edison, who had access to no
other instruments except those of the company. *T
went one night," he says, *'into the battery-room to
obtain some sulphuric acid for experimenting. The
carboy tipped over, the acid ran out, went through
to the manager's room below, and ate up his desk
and all the carpet. The next morning I was sum-
moned before him, and told that what the company
wanted was operators, not experimenters. I was at
liberty to take my pay and get out."

Thus he was once more thrown upon the world.
He went back to Cincinnati, and began his second
term there as an operator. He was again put on

69

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

night duty, much to his satisfaction. He rented a
room on the top floor of an office building, bought
a cot and an oil-stove, a foot lathe, and some tools.

He became acquainted with Mr. Sommers, super-
intendent of telegraph of the Cincinnati & Indian-
apolis Railroad, who gave him permission to take
such scrap apparatus as he might desire that was of
no use to the company.

Edison and Sommers became very friendly, and
were congenial in many ways. Both of them en-
joyed jokes of a practical nature, and Edison relates
one of them as follows : "Sommers was a very
witty man," he says, "and fond of experimenting.
We worked on a self-adjusting telegraph relay,
which would have been very valuable if we could
have got it. I soon became the possessor of a
second-hand Ruhmkorff induction coil, which, al-
though it would only give a small spark, would
twist the arms and clutch the hands of a man so
that he could not let go of the apparatus. One day
we went down to the roundhouse of the Cincinnati
& Indianapolis Railroad and connected up the long
wash-tank in the room with the coil, one electrode
being connected to earth. Above this wash-room
was a flat roof. We bored a hole through the roof,
and could see the men as they came in. The first
man as he entered dipped his hands in the water.
The floor, being wet, formed a circuit, and up went
his hands. He tried it the second time, with the
same result. He then stood against the wall with
a puzzled expression. We surmised that he was
waiting for somebody else to come in, which oc-

70

ADVENTURES

curred shortly after, with the same result. Then
they went out, and the place was soon crowded and
there was considerable excitement. Various theories
were broached to explain the curious phenomenon.
We enjoyed the sport immensely."

The reader must remember this occurred forty
years ago, when electricity was not popularly under-
stood. Had it occurred to-day the mystery would
have soon been explained.

It is interesting to note that the germ of Edison's
quadruplex originated while he was at the Cincin-
nati office. There he became acquainted with
George Ellsworth, a telegraph operator who left the
regular telegraph service to become an operator for
the Confederate guerilla Morgan.

'*We soon became acquainted," says Edison of
this period in Cincinnati, ''and he wanted me to in-
vent a secret method of sending despatches, so that
an intermediate operator could not tap the wire and
understand it. He said that if it could be accom-
plished he could sell it to the government for a large
sum of money. This suited me, and I started in and
succeeded in making such an instrument, which had
in it the germ of my quadruplex now used through-
out the world, permitting the despatch of four mes-
sages over one wire simultaneously. By the time I
had succeeded in getting the apparatus to work Ells-
worth suddenly disappeared. Many years afterward
I used this little device again for the same purpose.
At Menlo Park, New Jersey, I had my laboratory.
There were several Western Union wires cut into
the laboratory and used by me in experimenting at

71

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

night. One day I sat near an instrument which I
had left connected during the night. I soon found
it was a private wire between New York and Phila-
delphia, and I heard among a lot of stuff a message
that surprised me. A week after that I had occasion
to go to New York, and, visiting the office of the
lessee of the wire, I asked him if he hadn't sent
such and such a message. The expression that came
over his face was a sight. He asked me how I knew
of such message. I told him the circumstances, and
suggested that he had better cipher such communica-
tions, or put on a secret sounder. The result of the
interview was that I installed for him my old Cin-
cinnati apparatus, which was used thereafter for
many years."

Edison's second term in Cincinnati was not a very
long one. After a while he left and went home to
Port Huron, where he stayed a short time. He soon
became tired of comparative idleness and communi-
cated with his old friend, Milton Adams, who was
then working in Boston, and whom he wished to
rejoin if he could get work promptly in the East.

Edison himself gives the details of this eventful
move, when he went East to grow up with the new
art of electricity. "I had left Louisville the second
time, and went home to see my parents. After
stopping at home for some time, I got restless, and
thought I would like to work in the East. Knowing
that a former operator named Adams, who had
worked with me in the Cincinnati office, was in
Boston, I wrote him that I wanted a job there. He
wrote back that if I came on immediately he could

72

ADVENTURES

get me in the Western Union office. I had helped
out the Grank Trunk Railroad telegraph people by
a new device when they lost one of the two sub-
marine cables they had across the river, making the
remaining cable act just as well for their purpose as
if they had two. I thought I was entitled to a pass,
which they conceded, and I started for Boston.
After leaving Toronto a terrific blizzard came up
and the train got snowed under in a cut. After
staying there twenty-four hours, the trainmen made
snow-shoes of fence-rail splints and started out to
find food, which they did about a half mile away.
They found a roadside inn, and by means of snow-
shoes all the passengers were taken to the inn. The
train reached Montreal four days late. A number
of the passengers and myself went to the military
headquarters to testify in favor of a soldier who had
been two days late in returning from a furlough^
which was a serious matter with military people, I
learned. We willingly did this, for this soldier was
a great story-teller, and made the time pass quickly.
I met here a telegraph operator named Stanton,
who took me to his boarding-house, the most cheer-
less I have ever been in. Nobody got enough to
eat; the bedclothes were too short and too thin; it
was twenty-eight degrees below zero, and the wash-
water was frozen solid. The board was cheap, being
only one dollar and fifty cents a week.

''Stanton said that the usual live-stock accompani-
ment of operators' boarding-houses was absent; he
thought the intense cold had caused them to hiber-
nate. Stanton, when I was working in Cincinnati,

73

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

left his position and went out on the Union Pacific
to work at Julesburg, which was a cattle town at
that time and very tough. I remember seeing him
off on the train, never expecting to meet him again.
Six months afterward, while working press wire in
Cincinnati, about 2 a.m., there was flung into the
middle of the operating-room a large tin box. It
made a report like a pistol, and we all jumped up
startled. In walked Stanton. 'Gentlemen,' he said,
'I have just returned from a pleasure trip to the
land beyond the Mississippi. All my wealth is con-
tained in my metallic traveling-case, and you are
welcome to it.' The case contained one paper collar.
He sat down, and I noticed that he had a woolen
comforter around his neck, with his coat buttoned
closely. The night was intensely warm. He then
opened his coat and revealed the fact that he had
nothing but the bare skin. 'Gentlemen,' said he,
'you see before you an operator who has reached
the limit of impecuniosity/ "

74

VIII

WORK AND INVENTION IN BOSTON

WHEN Milton Adams received Edison's letter
from Port Huron he at once went over to the
Western Union Office and asked the manager, Mr.
George F. Milliken, if he did not want a good
operator from the West.

''What kind of copy does he make?" was the
cautious response. Adams says : ''I passed Edison's
letter through the window for his inspection. Mil-
liken read it and a look of surprise came over his
countenance as he asked me if he could take it off
the Une like that. I said he certainly could, and that
there was nobody who could stick him. Milliken
said if he was that kind of an operator I could send
for him; and I wrote Edison to come on, as I had
a job for him in the main office of the Western
Union."

On reporting to Mr. Milliken in Boston, Edison
secured a ''job" very quickly. As he tells the story,
he says : "The manager asked me when I was ready
to go to work. 'Now,' I replied. I was then told to
return at 5.30 p.m., and punctually at that hour I
entered the main operating-room and was intro-
duced to the night manager. The weather being
cold, and being clothed poorly, my peculiar appear-
ance caused much mirth, and, as I afterward learned,

75

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

the night operators had consulted together how they
might 'put up a job on the jay from the woolly
West/ I was given a pen and assigned to the New
York No. I wire. After waiting an hour, I was
told to come over to a special table and take a special
report for the Boston Herald, the conspirators hav-
ing arranged to have one of the fastest senders in
New York send the despatch and 'salt' the new man.
I sat down unsuspiciously at the table, and the New
York man started slowly. Soon he increased his
speed, to which I easily adapted my pace. This put
my rival on his mettle, and he put on his best powers,
which, however, were soon reached. At this point
I happened to look up, and saw the operators all
looking over my shoulder, with their faces shining
with fun and excitement. I knew then that they
were trying to put up a job on me, but kept my own
counsel. The New York man then commenced to
slur over his words, running them together and
sticking the signals; but I had been used to this
style of telegraphy in taking report, and was not in
the least discomfited. Finally, when I thought the
fun had gone far enough, and having about com-
pleted the special, I quietly opened the key and re-
marked, telegraphically, to my New York friend,
'Say, young man, change off and send with your
other foot.' This broke the New York man all up,
and he turned the job over to another man to finish."
Edison did not devote his whole life at this time
to the routine work of a telegraph office. His
insatiable desire for knowledge led him to study
deeply the underlying principles of electricity that

76

WORK IN BOSTON

made telegraphy possible, and he was constantly ex-
perimenting to improve the apparatus he handled
daily, as well as pursuing his studies in chemistry.

One day he was more than delighted to pick up
a complete set of Faraday's works. Mr. Adams says
that when Edison brought home these books, at
4 A.M., he read steadily until breakfast time, and
then he remarked, enthusiastically, ''Adams, I have
got so much to do and life is so short I am going to
hustle." And thereupon he started on a run for
breakfast. Edison himself says : "It was in Boston
I bought Faraday's works. I think I must have tried
about everything in those books. His explanations
were simple. He used no mathematics. He was
the master experimenter. I don't think there were
many copies of Faraday's works sold in those days.
The only people who did anything in electricity were
the telegraphers and the opticians, making simple
school aparatus to demonstrate the principles."

At this time there was a number of practical in-
vestigators and electrical workers in Boston, and
Edison with his congenial tastes soon became very
much at home with them. He spent a great deal of
time among them, and especially in the electrical
workshop of the late Charles Williams, who after-
ward became an associate of Alexander Graham
Bell.

It was in this workshop that Edison worked out
into an operative model his first patented invention,
a vote recorder. This forms the subject of Edison's
first patent, for which application was signed on

71

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

October ii, 1868, the patent itself being taken out
June I, 1869, No. 90,646.

The purpose of this particular device was to per-
mit a vote in the National House of Representatives
to be taken in a minute or so. Edison took the vote
recorder to Washington and exhibited it before a
committee. In recalling the circumstance, he says :
'The chairman of the committee, after seeing how
quickly and perfectly it worked, said : 'Young man,
if there is any invention on earth that we don't
want down here it is this. One of the greatest
weapons in the hands of a minority to prevent bad
legislation is filibustering on votes, and this instru-
ment would prevent it.' I saw the truth of this,
because as press operator I had taken miles of Con-
gressional proceedings, and to this day an enormous
amount of time is wasted during each session of the
House in foolishly calling the members' names and
recording, and then adding, their votes, when the
whole operation could be done in almost a moment
by merely pressing a particular button at each desk.
For filibustering purposes, however, the present
methods are most admirable."

The outcome of this exhibition was a great dis-
appointment to the young inventor, but it proved to
be a wholesome lesson, for he determined from that
time forth to devote his inventive faculties only to
things for which there was a real, genuine demand.
We shall see later that he has ever since lived up to
the decision then made.

After the above incident Edison, with increased
earnestness, resumed his study of electricity, espe-

78

WORK IN BOSTON

cially in its application to telegraphy. He did not
neglect his chemistry, however, but indulged his
tastes freely in that direction, thus laying the founda-
tion for the remarkable chemical knowledge that en-
abled him later to make some of his great inventions.

He tells an amusing incident of one of his chemi-
cal experiments of this early period : '*I had read in
a scientific paper the method of making nitro-
glycerin, and was so fired by the wonderful prop-
erties it was said to possess that I determined to
make some of the compound. We tested what we
considered a very small quantity, but this produced
such terrible and unexpected results that we became
alarmed, the fact dawning upon us that we had a
very large white elephant in our possession. At
6 A.M. I put the explosive into a sarsaparilla bottle,
tied a string to it, wrapped it in a paper, and gently
let it down into the sewer at the corner of State and
Washington Streets."

The daily routine of a telegraph oflice and the
busy hours of reading and experimenting employed
Edison's time for eighteen to twenty hours a day.
Life, however, was never too strenuous for him to
indulge his humor, especially if it called for the
exercise of some ingenuity, as shown in the follow-
ing incident related by him : "The ofilice was on the
ground floor, and had been a restaurant previous to
its occupation by the Western Union Telegraph
Company. It was literally loaded with cockroaches,
which lived between the wall and the board running
around the room at the floor, and which came after
the lunch. These were such a bother on my table

79

THE BOYS^ LIFE OF EDISON

that I pasted two strips of tin-foil on the wall at my
desk, connecting one piece to the positive pole of the
big battery supplying current to the wires and the
negative pole to the other strip. The cockroaches
moving up on the wall would pass over the strips.
The moment they got their legs across both strips
there was a flash of light and the cockroaches went
into gas. This automatic electrocuting device got
half a column in an evening paper, and attracted so
much attention that the manager made me stop it."
About this time an innocent use of his chemical
knowledge gave Edison a narrow escape from injury
which might have shortened his career. He tells
the story as follows : "After being in Boston several
months, working New York wire No. i, I was
requested to work the press wire, called the 'milk
route,' as there were so many towns on it taking
press simultaneously. New York office had re-
ported great delays on the wire, due to operators
constantly interrupting, or 'breaking,' as it was
called, to have words repeated which they had failed
to get; and New York claimed that Boston was
one of the worst offenders. It was a rather hard
position for me, for if I took the report without
breaking, it would prove the previous Boston oper-
ator incompetent. The results made the operator
have some hard feelings against me. He was put
back on the wire, and did much better after that.
It seems that the office boy was down on this man.
One night he asked me if I could tell him how to
fix a key so that it would not 'break,' even if the
circuit-breaker was open, and also so that it could

80

WORK IN BOSTON

not fee easily detected. I told him to jab a penful
of ink on the platinum points, as there was sugar
enough in it to make it sufficiently thick to hold up
when the operator tried to break — ^the current still
going through the ink, so that he could not break.

''The next night about i a.m. this operator, on
the press wire, while I was standing near a House
printer studying it, pulled out a glass insulator, then
used upside down as a substitute for an ink-bottle,
and threw it with great violence at me, just missing
my head. It would certainly have killed me if it had
not missed. The cause of the trouble was that this
operator was doing the best he could not to break,
but, being compelled to open his key, he found he
couldn't. The press matter came right along, and
he could not stop it. The office boy had put the
ink in a few minutes before, when the operator had
turned his head during a lull. He blamed me in-
stinctively as the cause of the trouble. Later we
became good friends. He took his meals at the
same 'emaciator' that I did. His main object in life
seemed to be acquiring the art of throwing up
wash-pitchers and catching them without breaking
them. About a third of his salary was used up in
paying for pitchers."

One of the most amusing incidents of Edison's
life in Boston, occurred through a request received
at the Western Union office one day from the prin-
cipal of a select school for young ladies. The
principal desired to have some one sent up to the
school to exhibit and describe the Morse telegraph
to her "children."

8i

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

Edison, who was always ready to earn some extra
money for his experiments, and was already known
as the best-informed operator in the office, accepted
the task, inviting Adams to accompany him. What
happened is described by Adams as follows: "We
gathered up a couple of sounders, a battery, and
some wire, and at the appointed time called on her
to do the stunt. Her school-room was about twenty
by twenty feet, not including a small platform. We
rigged up the line between the two ends of the room,
Edison taking the stage, while I was at the other
end of the room. All being in readiness, the prin-
cipal was told to bring in her children. The door
opened, and in came about twenty young ladies ele-
gantly gowned, not one of whom was under seven-
teen. When Edison saw them I thought he would
faint. He called me on the line and asked me to
come to the stage and explain the mysteries of the
Morse system. I replied that I thought he was in
the right place, and told him to get busy with his
talk on dots and dashes. Always modest, Edison
was so overcome he could hardly speak, but he man-
aged to say finally that, as his friend, Mr. Adams,
was better equipped with cheek than he was, we
would change places, and he would do the demon-
strating while I explained the whole thing. This
caused the bevy to turn to see where the lecturer
was. I went on the stage, said something, and we
did some telegraphing over the line. I guess it was
satisfactory; we got the money, which was the main
point to us."

Edison tells the story in a similar manner, but

^2

WORK IN BOSTON

insists that it was he who saved the situation. "I
managed to say that I would work the apparatus,
and Mr. Adams would make the explanations.
Adams was so embarrassed that he fell over an otto-
man. The girls tittered, and this increased his em-
barrassment until he couldn't say a word. The situ-
ation was so desperate that for a reason I never
could explain I started in myself and talked and
explained better than I ever did before or since. I
can talk to two or three persons, but when there
are more they radiate some unknown form of in-
fluence which paralyzes my vocal cords. However,
I got out of this scrape, and many times afterward
when I chanced with other operators to meet some
of the young ladies on their way home from school
they would smile and nod, much to the mystification
of the operators, who were ignorant of this episode."

The purchase of supplies and apparatus for his
constant experiments and studies kept Edison's
pocket-money at low ebb. He never had a surplus
of cash, and tells this amusing story of those im-
pecunious days:

"My friend Adams was working in the Franklin
Telegraph Company, which competed with the
Western Union. Adams was laid off, and as his
financial resources had reached absolute zero centi-
grade, I undertook to let him sleep in my hall bed-
room. I generally had hall bedrooms, because they
were cheap and I needed money to buy apparatus.
I also had the pleasure of his genial company at the
boarding-house about a mile distant, but at the

83

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

sacrifice of some apparatus. One morning, as we
were hastening to breakfast, we came into Tremont
Row, and saw a large crowd in front of two small
Agents' ' furnishing goods stores. We stopped to
ascertain the cause of the excitement. One store put
up a paper sign in the display window which said,
'Three hundred pairs of stockings received this day,
five cents a pair — no connection with the store next
door.' Presently the other store put up a sign stating
they had received three hundred pairs, price three
cents a pair, also that they had no connection with the
store next door. Nobody went in. The crowd kept
increasing. Finally, when the price had reached
three pairs for one cent, Adams said to me : T can't
stand this any longer; give me a cent.* I gave him a
cent, and he elbowed his way in; and throwing the
money on the counter, the store being filled with
women clerks, he said, 'Give me three pairs.' The
crowd was breathless, and the girl took down a box
and drew out three pairs of baby socks. 'Oh !' said
Adams, 'I want men's size.' 'Well, sir, we do not
permit one to pick sizes for that amount of money.'
And the crowd roared, and this broke up the sales."

During Edison's first stay in Boston he began to
weary of the monotonous routine of a telegraph
operator's life and took steps to establish himself in
an independent business. It was at this point that
he began his career as an inventor.

He says: "After the vote recorder I invented a
stock ticker, and started a ticker service in Boston,
had thirty or forty subscribers, and operated from a

84

WORK IN BOSTON

room over the Gold Exchange. This was about a
year after Callahan started in New York."

It has been generally supposed that Edison did
not take up stock ticker work until he left Boston
finally and went to New York in 1869. But the
above shows that he actually started a ticker service
in Boston in 1868.

The stock ticker had been invented about a year
before, 1867, by E. A. Callahan, and had then been
introduced into service in New York. Its success
was immediate, and it became the common ambition
of every operator to invent a new ticker, as there
seemed to be a promise of great wealth in this direc-
tion. Edison, however, was about the only one in
Boston who seems to have achieved any tangible
result.

This was not by any means all the practical work
he did in Boston at this time, as we learn from
his own words. He says : 'T also engaged in put-
ting up private lines, upon which I used an alpha-
betical dial instrument for telegraphing between
business establishments, a forerunner of modern
telephony. This instrument was very simple and
practical, and any one could work it after a few
minutes' explanation. I had these instruments made
at Mr. Hamblet's, who had a little shop where he
was engaged in experimenting with electric clocks.
Mr. Hamblet was the father and introducer in after
years of the Western Union Telegraph system of
time distribution. My laboratory was the head-
quarters for the men, and also of tools and supplies

85

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

for those private lines. They were put up cheaply,
as I used the roofs of houses, just as the Western
Union did. It never occurred to me to ask permis-
sion from the owners ; all we did was to go to the
store, etc., say we were telegraph men, and wanted
to go up to the wires on the roof; and permission
was always granted.

**In this laboratory I had a large induction coil
which I had borrowed to make some experiments
with. One day I got hold of both electrodes of the
coil, and it clinched my hands on them so that I
couldn't let go. The battery was on a shelf. The
only way I could get free was to back off and pull
the coil, so that the battery wires would pull the
cells off the shelf and thus break the circuit. I shut
my eyes and pulled, but the nitric acid splashed all
over my face and ran down my back. I rushed to a
sink, which was only half big enough, and got in as
well as I could and wiggled around for several min-
utes to permit the water to dilute the acid and stop
the pain. My face and back were streaked with
yellow ; the skin was thoroughly oxidized. I did not
go on the street by daylight for two weeks, as the
appearance of my face was dreadful. The skin,
however, peeled off, and new skin replaced it with-
out any damage."

With all the practical work he was now doing,
Boston seemed to be too limited a sphere, and Edi-
son longed for the greater opportunities of New
York. His friend Adams went West to continue a
life of roving and adventure, but the serious-minded
Edison had had more than enough of aimless roam-

86

WORK IN BOSTON

ing, and had determined to forge ahead on the lines
on which he was working.

ReaHzing that he must look to New York to bet-
ter his fortunes, Edison, deep in debt for his new
inventions, but with high hope and courage, now
made the next momentous step in his career.

87

IX

FROM POVERTY TO INDEPENDENCE

EDISON came first to New York in 1868, with his
early stock printer, which he tried unsuccess-
fully to sell. He went back to Boston, and, quite
undismayed, got up a duplex telegraph. * 'Toward
the end of my stay in Boston," he says, "I obtained
a loan of money, amounting to eight hundred dol-
lars, to build up a peculiar kind of duplex telegraph
for sending two messages over a single wire simul-
taneously. The apparatus was built, and I left the
Western Union employ and went to Rochester, New
York, to test the apparatus on the lines of the At-
lantic and Pacific Telegraph between that city and
New York. But the assistant at the other end could
not be made to understand anything, notwithstand-
ing I had written out a very minute description of
just what to do. After trying for a week I gave it
up and returned to New York with but a few cents
in my pocket."

No one could have been in direr poverty than
Edison when the steamboat landed him in New York
in 1869. He was in debt, and his few belongings
in books and instruments had to be left behind. He
was not far from starving.

After leaving the boat his first thought was for
breakfast; but he was without money to obtain it.

88

INDEPENDENCE

He walked the streets, and in passing a wholesale
tea house saw a man "tasting" tea, so he went in
and asked the "taster" if he might have some tea.
His request was granted, and this was his first
breakfast in New York.

He knew a telegraph operator in the city, and
in the course of the day succeeded in finding him,
but he also was out of work, and the best he could
do was to lend Edison one dollar.

By this time Edison was extremely hungry, and he
gave most serious consideration as to what he should
buy in the way of food that would be most satisfy-
ing. He finally decided upon apple dumplings and
coffee, which he obtained at Smith & McNeil's res-
taurant. He says he never ate anything more ap-
petizing.

He applied to the Western Union Company for
a position as operator, but as there was no imme-
diate vacancy he was obliged to wait for an opening.
Having only the remainder of the borrowed dollar,
he did not want to spend it for lodging, so he got
permission to stay overnight in the battery-room of
the Gold Indicator Company. Thus he kept what
little change he had to buy food.

This was four years after the Civil War, but its
effects were felt everywhere, and notably in the de-
preciation of government securities and our paper
money. Gold, being the standard, was regarded as
much more valuable than a paper promise to pay
issued by a government heavily in debt. A gold
dollar, therefore, would buy much more than a
paper dollar, at times a dollar and a quarter, or a

89

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

dollar and a half in value. In a word, gold com-
manded a high premium. For several years after-
ward there was a great deal of speculation in the
precious metal, and a "Gold Room" had been estab-
lished in Wall Street, where the transactions took
place. At first the prices were exhibited on a black-
board there, but before long this plan was found to
be too slow for the brokers. Then Dr. S. S. Laws,
vice president and presiding officer of the Gold
Exchange, invented a system of indicators to be
placed in the offices of brokers. These indicators
were operated from a complicated transmitting in-
strument at the Exchange, and each one showed the
fluctuations of price as transactions took place. Dr.
Laws resigned from the Exchange and organized the
Gold Indicator Company, which put the system into
operation.

At the time when Edison took shelter at night in
the battery-room of the company there were about
three hundred instruments in the offices of sub-
scribers. While waiting to hear from the Western
Union, Edison spent his days studying the indi-
cators and the complicated transmitting instrument
in the office, controlled from the keyboard of the
operator on the floor of the Gold Exchange.

What happened next has been the basis of many
inaccurate stories, but the following is Mr. Edison's
own version : *'0n the third day of my arrival, and
while sitting in the office, the complicated general
instrument for sending on all the lines, and which
made a very great noise, suddenly came to a stop
with a crash. Within two minutes over three hun-

90

INDEPENDENCE

dred boys — a boy from every broker in the street —
rushed up-stairs and crowded the long aisle and
office, that hardly had room for one hundred, all
yelling that such and such a broker's wire was out
of order and to fix it at once. It was pandemonium,
and the man in charge became so excited that he lost
control of all the knowledge he ever had. I went to
the indicator, and, having studied it thoroughly,
knew where the trouble ought to be, and found it.
One of the innumerable contact springs had broken
oif and had fallen down between the two gear-
wheels and stopped the instrument; but it was not
very noticeable. As I went out to tell the man in
charge what the matter was Dr. Laws appeared
on the scene, the most excited person I had seen.
He demanded of the man the cause of the trouble,
but the man was speechless. I ventured to say that
I knew what the trouble was, and he said, Tix it!
Fix it! Be quick!' I removed the spring and set
the contact wheels at zero ; and the line, battery, and
inspecting men all scattered through the financial
district to set the instruments. In about two hours
things were working again. Dr. Laws came in to
ask my name and what I was doing. I told him, and
he asked me to come to his private office the follow-
ing day. His office was filled with stacks of books
all relating to metaphysics and kindred matters. He
asked me a great many questions about the instru-
ments and his system, and I showed him how he
could simplify things generally. He then requested
that I should call next day. On arrival, he stated
at once that he had decided to put me in charge of

91

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

the whole plant, and that my salary would be three
hundred dollars a month! This was such a violent
jump from anything I had ever had before that it
rather paralyzed me for a while. I thought it was
too much to be lasting ; but I determined to try and
live up to that salary if twenty hours a day of hard
work would do it. I kept this position, made many
improvements, devised several stock tickers, until the
Gold and Stock Telegraph Company consolidated
with the Gold Indicator Company."

Certainly few changes in fortune have been more
sudden and dramatic in any notable career than this
which thus placed an ill-clad, unkempt, half -starved,
eager lad in a position of such responsibility in days
when the fluctuations in the price of gold at every in-
stant meant fortune or ruin to thousands.

There was at this time a very active period of
speculation, and not a great while afterward came
the attempt of Jay Gould and his associates to cor-
ner the gold market by buying all the available sup-
ply. This brought about the panic of Black Friday,
September 24, 1869.

Edison, then but twenty-two years old, was a
keen observer, and his recollection of this episode is
interesting. "On Black Friday," he says, *Sve had
a very exciting time with the indicators. The Gould
and Fisk crowd had cornered gold, and had run the
quotations up faster than the indicator could follow.
The indicator was composed of several wheels; on
the circumference of each wheel were the numerals;
and one wheel had fractions. It worked in the

92

INDEPENDENCE

same way as an ordinary counter; one wheel made
ten revolutions, and at the tenth it advanced the
adjacent wheel ; and this, in its turn having gone ten
revolutions, advanced the next wheel, and so on. On
the morning of Black Friday the indicator was quot-
ing one hundred and fifty premium, whereas the bids
by Gould's agents in the Gold Room were one hun-
dred and sixty-five for five millions or any part.
We had a paper-weight at the transmitter (to speed
it up), and by one o'clock reached the right quota-
tion. The excitement was prodigious. New Street,
as well as Broad Street, was jammed with excited
people. I sat on the top of the Western Union tele-
graph booth to watch the surging, crazy crowd. One
man came to the booth, grabbed a pencil, and at-
tempted to write a message to Boston. The first
stroke went clear oflF the blank; he was so excited
that he had the operator write the message for him.
Amid great excitement Speyer, the banker, went
crazy, and it took five men to hold him ; and every-
body lost their heads. The Western Union operator
came to me and said : 'Shake, Edison, we are O. K.
We haven't got a cent.' I felt very happy because
we were poor. These occasions are very enjoyable
to a poor man; but they occur rarely."

Edison in those days rather liked the modest
coflFee-shops and mentions visiting one. ''When on
the New York No. i wire that I worked in Boston
there was an operator named Jerry Borst at the
other end. He was a first-class receiver and rapid
sender. We made up a scheme to hold this wire, so

93

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

he changed one letter of the alphabet and I soon got
used to it ; and finally we changed three letters. If
any operator tried to receive from Borst he couldn't
do it, so Borst and I always worked together. Borst
did less talking than any operator I ever knew.
Never having seen him, I went, while in New York,
to call upon him. I did all the talking. He would
listen, stroke his beard, and say nothing. In the
evening I went over to an all-night lunch-house in
Printing House Square, in a basement — Oliver's.
Night editors, including Horace Greeley, and Henry
Raymond, of the New York Times, took their mid-
night lunch there. When I went with Borst and
another operator they pointed out two or three men
who were then celebrated in the newspaper world.
The night was intensely hot and close. After get-
ting our lunch and upon reaching the sidewalk,
Borst opened his mouth, and said: That's a great
place; a plate of cakes, a cup of coffee, and a Russian
bath for ten cents.* This was about fifty per cent.
of his com^ersation for two days."

The work of Edison on the gold indicator had
thrown him into close relationship with Mr. Frank-
lin L. Pope, a young telegraph engineer, and after-
ward a distinguished expert and technical writer.
Each recognized the special ability of the other,
and barely a week after Black Friday the announce-
ment of their partnership appeared in the Teleg-
rapher of October i, 1869.

This was the first "professional card," if it may
be so described, ever issued in America by a firm
of electrical engineers.

94

INDEPENDENCE

Tn order to be near his new friend, Edison boarded
with Pope at Elizabeth, New Jersey, for some time
living the "strenuous life" in the performance of
his duties and following up his work on telegraph
printers with marked success.

In regard to this Mr. Edison says : * While with
them" (Pope and J. N. Ashley) "I devised a printer
to print gold quotations instead of indicating them.
The lines were started, and the whole was sold out
to the Gold and Stock Telegraph Company. My
experimenting was all done in the small shop of a
Dr. Bradley, located near the station of the Penn-
sylvania Railroad in Jersey City. Every night I
left for Elizabeth on the i a.m. train, then walked
half a mile to Mr. Pope's house, and up at 6 a.m.
for breakfast, to catch the 7 a.m. train. This con-
tinued all winter, and many were the occasions when
I was nearly frozen in the Elizabeth walk."

After the Edison and Pope printer was bought
out by the Gold and Stock Telegraph Company, its
president, Gen. Marshall Lefferts, requested Edison
to go to work on improving the stock ticker, he,
Lefferts, to furnish the money.

Edison tackled the subject enthusiastically, and
as one result produced the ''Universal" ticker, which
came into wide-spread use in its day. This and
some other inventions had a startling effect on his
fortunes. Mr. Edison says : "I made a great many
inventions ; one was the special ticker used for many
years outside of New York in the large cities. This
was made exceedingly simple, as they did not have
the experts we had in New York to handle anything

95

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

complicated. The same ticker was used on the Lon-
don Stock Exchange. After I had made a great
number of inventions and obtained patents, the Gen-
eral seemed anxious that the matter should be closed
up. One day I exhibited and worked a successful
device whereby, if a ticker should get out of unison
in a broker's office and commence to print wild
figures, it could be brought to unison from the cen-
tral station, which saved the labor of many men and
much trouble to the broker. He called me into his
office, and said : 'Now, young man, I want to close
up the matter of your inventions. How much do
you think you should receive?' I had made up my
mind that, taking into consideration the time and
killing pace I was working at, I should be entitled to
five thousand dollars, but could get along with three
thousand dollars. When the psychological moment
arrived, I hadn't the nerve to name such a large
sum, so I said: 'Well, General, suppose you make
me an oiifer.' Then he said: 'How would forty
thousand dollars strike you?' This caused me to
come as near fainting as I ever got. I was afraid
he would hear my heart beat. I managed to say
that I thought it was fair. 'All right, I will have
a contract drawn; come around in three days and
sign it, and I will give you the money.' I arrived on
time, but had been doing some considerable thinking
on the subject. The sum seemed to be very large for
the amount of work, for, at that time I determined
the value by the time and trouble, and not by what
the invention was worth to others. I thought there
was something unreal about it. However, the con-

96

INDEPENDENCE

tract was handed to me. I signed without reading
it."

Edison was then handed the first check he had
ever received, one for forty thousand dollars. He
went down to the bank and passed the check in to the
paying teller, who handed it back to him with some
remarks which in his deafness he did not hear.
Fancying for a moment he had been cheated, Edison
went outside "to let the cold sweat evaporate."

He went back to the General, who, with his secre-
tary, had a good laugh over the matter, and told
him the check must be endorsed, and sent with him a
clerk to identify him.

The ceremony of identification performed with
the paying teller, who was quite merry over the
incident, Edison was given the amount in bundles
of small bills "until there certainly seemed to be one
cubic foot." Unaware that he was the victim of a
practical joke, Edison proceeded gravely to stow
away the money in his overcoat pockets and all his
other pockets. He then went to Newark and sat
up all night with the money for fear it might be
stolen. Once more he sought help next morning,
when the General laughed heartily, and, telling the
clerk that the joke must not be carried any further,
enabled him to deposit the currency in the bank and
open an account — his first bank account.

Thus in a very brief time Edison had passed from
poverty to independence. Not only that, but he had
made a deep impression as to his originality and
ability on important people, and had brought out
valuable inventions. Thus he lifted himself at one

97

THE ROYS' LIFE OF EDISON

hound out of the ranks and away from the drudgery
ol the key.

Many youn^ men of twenty-two would have been
so (.hizzled by coming suddenly Into tK)ssession of
forty thousand dollars after a period of poverty,
striig«;le, and hard work, that their main ideas would
have been of recreation and pleasure. Not so with
Edison, however. Naturally enterprising and a pio-
neer, this money meant to him nothing but means
to an end.

He bought some machinery and opened a small
shop and got work for it. Very quickly he was
compelled to move to larger (piarters, Nos. lo and 12
Ward Street, Newark, New Jersey. He secured
large orders from General LetTerts to build stock
tickers, and employed fifty men.

As business increased he put on a night force,
and was his own foreman in both shifts. Half an
hour of sleep three or four times in the twenty-four
hours was all he needed. His force increased to one
hundred and fifty men, and, besides superintending
all the work day and night, he was constantly mak-
ing new inventions in the lines on which he was then
working, which was chielly stock tickers.

A glimpse at some of young Edison's first methods
as a manufacturer is interesting. He says : ''Nearly
all my men were on piece-work, and I allowed them
to make good wages, and never cut until the pay
became absurdly high as they got more expert. I
kept no books. T had two hooks. All the bills and
accounts I owed I jabbed on one hook, and memo-
randa of all owed to myself I put on the other.

98

INDEPENDENCE

When some of the bills fell due, and I couldn't
deliver tickers to get a supply of money, I gave a
note. When the notes were due a messenger came
around from the bank with the note and a protest
pinned to it for one dollar and twenty-five cents.
Then I would go to New York and get an advance
or pay the note if I had the money. This method
of giving notes for my accounts and having all
notes protested I kept up over two years, yet my
credit was fine. Every store I traded with was al-
ways glad to furnish goods, perhaps in amazed ad-
miration of my system of doing business, which was
certainly new."

After a while Edison got a bookkeeper, whose
vagaries made him look back with regret on the
earlier, primitive method. "The first three months
I had him go over the books to find out how much
we had made. He reported three thousand dollars.
I gave a supper to some of my men to celebrate this,
only to be told two days afterward that he had made
a mistake, and that we had lost five hundred dollars ;
and then a few days after that he came to me again
and said he was all mixed up, and now found that
we had made over seven thousand dollars." Edison
changed bookkeepers, but never afterward counted
anything real profit until he had paid all his debts
and had the profits in the bank.

Among the men who have worked with Edison
in his various shops from time to time, there have
always been those who later have risen to some
notable degree of prominence in the electrical arts.
This early shop was no exception.

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

At a single bench there worked three men since
rich or prominent. One was Sigmund Bergmann,
for a time partner with Edison in his Hghting de-
velopments in the United States, and now head and
principal owner of electrical works in Berlin, em-
ploying ten thousand men. The next man adjacent
was John Kruesi, afterward engineer of the great
General Electric Works at Schenectady. A third
was Schuckert, who left the bench to settle up his
father's little estate at Nuremberg, stayed there and
founded electrical factories which became the third
largest in Germany, their proprietor dying very
wealthy.

'T gave them a good training as to working hours
and hustling," says Edison. And this is equally true
as applied to many scores of others who have worked
with him.

100

X

A BUSY YOUNG INVENTOR

EDISON had now plunged into the intensely active
life that has never since ceased. Some idea of
his activity may be gained from the fact that he
started no fewer than three manufacturing shops in
Newark during 1870-71. All of these he directed
personally, besides busying himself with many of his
own schemes.

Speaking of those days, he says: *'Soon after
starting the large shop (10 and 12 Ward Street,
Newark), I rented shop-room to the inventor of a
new rifle. I think it was the Berdan. In any event,
it was a rifle which was subsequently adopted by the
British army. The inventor employed a tool-maker
who was the finest and best I had ever seen. I no-
ticed that he worked pretty near the whole of the
twenty-four hours. This kind of application I was
looking for. He was getting $21.50 a week, and
was also paid for overtime. I asked him if he could
run the shop. T don't know ; try me !' he said. *A11
right, I will give you sixty dollars a week to run both
shifts.' He went at it. His executive ability was
greater than that of any other man I have yet seen.
His memory was prodigious, conversation laconic,
and movements rapid. He doubled the production
inside three months, without materially increasing

lOI

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

the pay-roll, by increasing the cutting speed of tools
and by the use of various devices. When in need
of rest he would lie down on a work-bench, sleep
twenty or thirty minutes, and wake up fresh. As
this was just what I could do, I naturally conceived
a great pride in having such a man in charge of my
work. But almost everything has trouble connected
with it. He disappeared one day, and, although I
sent men everywhere that it was likely he could be
found, he was not discovered. After two weeks he
came into the factory in a terrible condition as to
clothes and face. He sat down, and, turning to me,
said: 'Edison, it's no use, this is the third time; I
can't stand prosperity. Put my salary back and give
me a job.' I was very sorry to learn that it was
whisky that spoiled such a career. I gave him an
inferior job and kept him for a long time."

Those were indeed busy days, when, at one time,
Edison, besides directing the work of his shops,
was working on no less than forty-five separate in-
ventions of his own. He had thus entered definitely
upon that career as an inventor which has left so
deep an imprint on the records of the Patent Office.

Soon after he commenced manufacturing he was
engaged by the Automatic Telegraph Company, of
New York, to help it out of its difficulties. An Eng-
lishman named George Little had brought over a
system of automatic telegraphy which worked well
on a short line, but was a failure when put upon the
longer circuits, for which automatic methods are best
adapted.

This principle of automatic telegraphy, briefly de-

102

A BUSY YOUNG INVENTOR

scribed, was somewhat as follows : A narrow paper
ribbon was perforated with groups of holes corre-
sponding to Morse characters. This ribbon was
passed over a cylinder, and a metallic pen was so
connected that it would drop into the holes as they
passed. The pen and cylinder being connected with
the telegraph line, a current would pass over the line
whenever the pen touched the cylinder. At the other
end of the line the electrical impulses passed through
another metallic pen, which rested upon another rib-
bon of paper chemically prepared, and, through elec-
tro-chemical action, would mark dots and dashes
upon the paper.

There were a great many very serious difficulties
to be overcome in order to make this system prac-
tical on long lines, but Edison applied himself to
the work with tremendous energy. His laboratory
note-books of the period show many thousands of
experiments in the three years that he was working
on his problem, and during this time he also took
out a long hst of patents on the subject.

So successful were his efforts that with his appa-
ratus it became possible to send and record one thou-
sand words a minute between New York and
Washington, and thirty-five hundred words a minute
between New York and Philadelphia.

Later on, Edison improved this system by further
inventions, by means of which the message at the
receiving end was automatically printed upon the
paper ribbon in Roman letters instead of dots and
dashes. Thus, the paper on which the message was
received could be torn off and sent out immediately

103

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

to the person for whom it was intended. This saved
time and expense, for under the previous system a
clerk must first translate the dots and dashes into
words and write it out before delivery. The appa-
ratus worked so perfectly that three thousand words
a minute were sent between New York and Philadel-
phia and recorded in Roman letters.

After Edison's automatic system was put into suc-
cessful use in America by the Automatic Telegraph
Company, an arrangement was made for a trial of
the system in England, involving its probable adop-
tion if successful. Edison went to England in 1873
to make the demonstration. He was to report there
to Col. George E. Gouraud, through whom the ar-
rangement had been made.

With one small satchel of clothes, three large
boxes of instruments, and a bright fellow-telegrapher
named Jack Wright, he took voyage on the Jump'
ing Java, as she was humorously known, of the
Cunard line. The voyage was rough, and the little
Java justified her reputation by jumping all over
the ocean. "At the table," says Edison, ''there were
never more than ten or twelve people. I wondered
at the time how it could pay to run an ocean steamer
with so few people ; but when we got into calm water
and could see the green fields, I was astounded to
see the number of people who appeared. There were
certainly two or three hundred. Only two days
could I get on deck, and on one of these a gentleman
had a bad scalp wound from being thrown against
the iron wall of a small smoking-room erected over
a freight hatch/'

104

A BUSY YOUNG INVENTOR

Arrived in London, Edison set up his apparatus at
the Telegraph Street headquarters, and sent his com-
panion to Liverpool with the instruments for that
end. The condition of the test was that he was to
record at the rate of one thousand words a minute,
five hundred words to be sent every half hour for six
hours. Edison was given a wire and batteries to
operate with, but a preliminary test soon showed that
he was going to fail. Both wire and batteries were
poor, and one of the men detailed by the authorities
to watch the test remarked quietly, in a friendly way :
**You are not going to have much show. They are
going to give you an old Bridgewater Canal wire
that is so poor we don't work it, and a lot of *sand
batteries' at Liverpool." ^

The situation was rather depressing to the young
American, but 'T thanked him," says Edison, "and
hoped to reciprocate somehow. I knew I was in a
hole. I had been staying at a little hotel in Covent
Garden called the Hummums, and got nothing but
roast beef and flounders, and my imagination was
getting into a coma. What I needed was pastry.
That night I found a French pastry shop in High
Holborn Street and filled up. My imagination got
all right. Early in the morning I saw Gouraud,
stated my case, and asked if he would stand for the
purchase of a powerful battery to send to Liverpool.
He said 'Yes.' I went immediately to Apps, on the
Strand, and asked if he had a powerful battery. He

^ The sand battery is now obsolete. In this type the cell con-
taining the elements was filled with sand, which was kept moist
with an electrolyte.

105

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

said he hadn't; that all that he had was Tyndall's
Royal Institution battery, which he supposed would
not serve. I saw it — one hundred cells — and getting
the price — one hundred guineas — hurried to Gou-
raud. He said 'Go ahead.' I telegraphed to the
man in Liverpool. He came on, and got the battery
to Liverpool, set up and ready just two hours before
the test commenced. One of the principal things
that made the system a success was that the line was
put to earth at the sending end through a magnet,
and the extra current from this passed to the line
served to sharpen the recording waves. This new
battery was strong enough to pass a powerful cur-
rent through the magnet without materially dimin-
ishing the strength of the current." The test under
these more favorable circumstances was a success.
*The record was as perfect as copper plate, and not
a single remark was made in the 'time lost' column."
Edison was now asked if he thought he could get
a better speed through submarine cables with this
system, and replied that he would like a chance to try
it. For this purpose twenty -two hundred miles of
cable stored under water in tanks was placed at his
disposal from 8 p.m. until 6 a.m. He says: "This
just suited me, as I preferred night work. I got
my apparatus down and set up, and then to get a
preliminary idea of what the distortion of the signal
would be I sent a single dot, which should have
been recorded upon my automatic paper by a mark
about one thirty-second of an inch long. Instead
of that it was twenty-seven feet long. If I ever had
any conceit, it vanished from my boots up! I

1 06

A BUSY YOUNG INVENTOR

worked on this cable more than two weeks, and the
best I could do was two words per minute, which
was only one-seventh of what the guaranteed speed
of the cable should be when laid. What I did not
know at the time was that a coiled cable, owing to
induction, was infinitely worse than when laid out
straight, and that my speed was as good as, if not
better than, the regular system, but no one told me
this."

After a short stay in England Edison returned
to America. He states that the automatic was
finally adopted in England and used for many years ;
indeed, it is still in use there. But they took what-
ever they needed from his system, and he ''has never
had a cent from them."

On arriving home he resumed arduous work on
many of his inventions — chiefly those relating to du-
plex telegraphy. This subject had interested him at
various times for four or five years previously, and
he now returned to it with great vigor.

Many inventors had been working on multiple
transmission, and at this period a system of sending
two messages in opposite directions at the same time
over one wire had been invented by Joseph Stearns,
and had then lately come into use.

The subject of multiple transmission gave plenty
of play for ingenuity and was one that had great
fascination for Edison. He worked out many plans,
and in April, 1873, ^^^^ two applications for patents.
One of these covered an invention by which not
only could two messages be sent in opposite direc-
tions over one wire at the same time, but, if desired,

107

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

two separate messages could be sent simultaneously
in the same direction over a single wire. The for-
mer method was called the * 'duplex," and the latter
the "diplex."

Duplexing was accomplished by varying the
strength of the current, and diplexing by also vary-
ing the direction of the current. In this invention
there was the germ of the quadruplex, and now
Edison redoubled his efforts toward completing the
latter system, for, while duplexing doubled the ca-
pacity of a line, the quadruplex would increase it
four times.

He was working also on other inventions, but the
quadruplex claimed most of his attention. He says :
*'This problem was of the most difficult and com-
plicated kind, and I bent all my energies toward its
solution. It required a peculiar effort of the mind,
such as the imagining of eight different things mov-
ing simultaneously on a mental plane without any-
thing to demonstrate their efficiency."

It is, perhaps, hardly to be wondered at that,
when notified he would have to pay twelve and one-
half per cent, extra if his taxes in Newark were
not at once paid, he actually forgot his own name
when asked for it suddenly at the City Hall, and lost
his place in the line !

He succeeded, however, in inventing a successful
quadruplex system by a skilful combination of the
duplex and diplex with other ingenious devices. The
immense value of this invention may be realized
when it is stated that it has been estimated to have
saved from fifteen million to twenty million dollars

1 08

A BUSY YOUNG INVENTOR

in the cost of line construction in America. But
Mr. Edison received only a small amount for it. We
will let him tell the story in his own words :

'About this time I invented the quadruplex. I
wanted to interest the Western Union Telegraph
Company in it, with a view of selling it, but was un-
successful until I made an arrangement with the
chief electrician of the company, so that he could
be known as a joint inventor and receive a portion
of the money. At that time I was very short of
money, and needed it more than glory. This elec-
trician appeared to want glory more than money, so
it was an easy trade. I brought my apparatus over
and was given a separate room with a marble-tiled
floor — which, by the way, was a very hard kind of
floor to sleep on — and started in putting on the
finishing touches.

''After two months of very hard work I got a
detail at regular times of eight operators, and we
got it working nicely from one room to another over
a wire which ran to Albany and back. Under cer-
tain conditions of weather one side of the quad-
ruplex would work very shakily, and I had not
succeeded in ascertaining the cause of the trouble.
On a certain day, when there was a board meeting
of the company, I was to make an exhibition test.
The day arrived. I had picked the best operators
in New York, and they were familiar with the ap-
paratus. I arranged that, if a storm occurred and
the bad side got shaky, they should do the best they
could and draw freely on their imaginations. They
were sending old messages. About twelve o'clock

109

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

everything went wrong, as there was a storm some-
where near Albany, and the bad side got shaky. Mr.
Orton, the president, and William H. Vanderbilt
and the other directors came in. I had my heart
trying to climb up around my oesophagus. I was
paying a sheriff five dollars a day to withhold execu-
tion of judgment which had been entered against me
in a case which I had paid no attention to; and if
the quadruplex had not worked before the president
I knew I was to have trouble and might lose my
machinery. The New York Times came out next
day with a full account. I was given five thousand
dollars as part payment for the invention, which
made me easy, and I expected the whole thing would
be closed up. But Mr. Orton went on an extended
tour just about that time. I had paid for all the
experiments on the quadruplex and exhausted the
money, and I was again in straits. In the mean-
time I had introduced the apparatus on the lines of
the company, where it was very successful.

''At that time the general superintendent of the
Western Union was Gen. T. T. Eckert (who had
been Assistant Secretary of War with Stanton).
Eckert was secretly negotiating with Gould to leave
the Western Union and take charge of the Atlantic
and Pacific — Gould's company. One day Eckert
called me into his office and made inquiries about
money matters. I told him Mr. Orton had gone off
and left me without means, and I was in straits. He
told me I would never get another cent, but that he
knew a man who would buy it. I told him of my
arrangement with the electrician, and said I could

no

A BUSY YOUNG INVENTOR

not sell it as a whole to anybody ; but if I got enough
for it I would sell all my interest in any share I
might have. He seemed to think his party would
agree to this. I had a set of quadruplex over in my
shop, lo and 12 Ward Street, Newark, and he ar-
ranged to bring him over next evening to see the
apparatus. So the next day Eckert came over with
Jay Gould and introduced him to me. This was the
first time I had ever seen him. I exhibited and
explained the apparatus, and they departed. The
next day Eckert sent for me, and I v/as taken up
to Gould's house, which was near the Windsor
Hotel, Fifth Avenue. In the basement he had an
office. It was in the evening, and we went in by the
servants' entrance, as Eckert probably feared that
he was watched. Gould started in at once and asked
me how much I wanted. I said, 'Make me an offer.'
Then he said, T will give you thirty thousand dol-
lars.' I said, *I will sell any interest I may have for
that money,' which was something more than I
thought I could get. The next morning I went with
Gould to the office of his lawyers, Sherman & Ster-
ling, and received a check for thirty thousand dollars,
with a remark by Gould that I had got the steamboat
Plymouth Rock, as he had sold her for thirty thou-
sand dollars, and had just received the check. There
was a big fight on between Gould's company and the
Western Union, and this caused litigation. The
electrician, on account of the testimony involved, lost
his glory. The judge never decided the case, but
went crazy a few months afterward."

Mr. Gould controlled the Atlantic and Pacific
III

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

Telegraph Company and was aiming to get control
of the Western Union Company, and his purchase of
Edison's share in the quadruplex was an important
move in this direction.

Having learned of the success of Edison's auto-
matic system, mentioned in the early part of this
chapter, Mr. Gould's next move was to get control
of that. It was owned by Mr. Edison and his asso-
ciates of the Automatic Telegraph Company, and
that company was bought by Mr. Gould under an
agreement to pay four million dollars in stock. As
to this, Mr. Edison says : "After this, Gould wanted
me to help install the automatic system in the Atlan-
tic and Pacific Company, of which General Eckert
had been elected president, the company having
bought the Automatic Telegraph Company. I did
a lot of work for this company making automatic
apparatus in my shop at Newark."

Unfortunately for the inventor and his associates,
the terms of the contract have never been carried
out. Mr. Edison remarks in regard to this: "He"
(Gould) "took no pride in building up an enter-
prise. He was after money, and money only.
Whether the company was a success or a failure mat-
tered not to him. After he had hammered the West-
ern Union through his opposition company and had
tired out Mr. Vanderbilt, the latter retired from con-
trol, and Gould went in and consolidated his com-
pany and controlled the Western Union. He then
repudiated the contract with the Automatic Tele-
graph people, and they never received a cent for their
wires or patents, and I lost three years of very hard

112

A BUSY YOUNG INVENTOR

labor. But I never had any grudge against him,
because he was so able in his line, and as long as my
part was successful the money with me was a sec-
ondary consideration. When Gould got the Western
Union I knew no further progress in telegraphy was
possible, and I went into other lines.'*

One of the most remarkable suits in the history
of American jurisprudence arose out of this trans-
action. Mr. Edison and his associates sued Mr.
Gould in 1876 for the recovery of the contract price
of these inventions, and, at this writing, thirty-five
years later, the suit has not been finally decided. It
is now on appeal to the United States Supreme
Court.

A busier shop than that of the young inventor
during the years 1870 to 1874 would be difficult to
find. Not only was he and it engaged on the tre-
mendous problems of the automatic and quadruplex
systems, but the shop was also busy making stock
tickers. The hours were endless ; and on one occa-
sion when an order was on hand for a large quan-
tity of these instruments Edison locked the men in
until the job had been finished of making the ma-
chine perfect, and **all the bugs taken out," which
meant sixty hours of hard work before the difficul-
ties were overcome.

In addition to all this work, Edison gave attention
to many other things. One of them was the first
typewriter. In the early 'seventies Mr. D. N. Craig,
who was interested in the automatic, brought with
him from Milwaukee a Mr. Sholes, who had a
wooden model of a machine to which had been given

113

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

the then new and unfamiliar name of ''typewriter.'*
Mr. Craig was interested in the machine and put the
model in Edison's hands to perfect.

*'This typewriter proved a difficult thing," says
Edison, ''to make commercial. The alignment of
the letters was awful. One letter would be one-
sixteenth of an inch above the others, and all the
letters wanted to wander out of line. I worked
on it till the machine gave fair results. Some were
made and used in the office of the Automatic Com-
pany. Craig was very sanguine that some day all
business letters would be written on a typewriter.
He died before that took place ; but it gradually made
its way. The typewriter I got into commercial shape
is now known as the Remington. I now had five
shops, and with experimenting on this new scheme
I was pretty busy — at least I did not have ennui."

Later on, after the automatic was completed, and
Edison was installing the system for the Atlantic
and Pacific Telegraph Company he says: "About
this time I invented a district messenger call-box sys-
tem, and organized a company called the Domestic
Telegraph Company, and started in to install the
system in New York. I had great difficulty in get-
ting subscribers, having tried several canvassers,
who, one after the other, failed to get subscribers.
When I was about to give it up a test operator named
Brown, who was on the Automatic Telegraph wire
between New York and Washington, which passed
through my Newark shop, asked permission to let
him try and see if he couldn't get subscribers. I
hab. very little faith in his abiHty to get any, but J

114

A BUSY YOUNG INVENTOR

thought I would give him a chance, as he felt certain
of his ability to succeed. He started in, and the re-
sults were surprising. Within a month he had pro-
cured two hundred subscribers, and the company was
a success. I have never quite understood why six
men should fail absolutely, while the seventh man
should succeed. Perhaps hypnotism would account
for it. This company was sold out to the Atlantic
and Pacific Company."

This was not the first time that Edison had worked
on district messenger signal boxes, for as far back
as 1872 he had applied for a patent on a device of
this kind. Although he was not the first, he was a
very early inventor in this field.

It will be seen, therefore, that not all of his prob-
lems and inventions were connected with telegraphy.
He seemed to find relief in working on several lines
that were quite different and distinct, but all were
useful and capable of wide application. For in-
stance, when we take a piece of paraffin paper off
candy, chocolate, chewing-gum or other articles, we
scarcely realize that it owes its introduction to Mr.
Edison. Yet such is the fact, and we relate it in his
own modest words: ^Toward the latter part of
1875, in the Newark shop, I invented a device for
multiplying copies of letters, which I sold to Mr. A.
B. Dick, of Chicago, and in the years since it has
been introduced universally throughout the world.
It is called the mimeograph. I also invented devices
for making, and introduced, paraffin paper, now
used universally for wrapping up candy, etc."

In the mimeograph a stencil is prepared by writing

115

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

with a pointed pencil-like stylus on a tough prepared
paper placed on a finely grooved steel plate. The
pressure of the stylus causes the letters to be punc-
tured in the sheet by a series of minute perfora-
tions, thus forming a stencil from which hundreds
of copies can be made.

Edison accomplished the same perforating result
by two other inventions, one a pneumatic and the
other an electric motor. The latter was the one
which came into extensive use, and was called the
^'Edison electric pen." A tiny electric motor was
mounted on a pencil-like tube in which a pointed
stylus (connected to the motor) traveled to and
fro at a very high rate of speed. Current from a
battery was supplied to the motor through a flexible
cord, and the tube was held and used like a pencil,
as in the other case. As many as three thousand
copies have been made from such a stencil.

ii6

XI

THE TELEPHONE, MOTOGRAPH, AND MICROPHONE

IT IS well known that to Mr. Alexander Graham
Bell belongs the credit for transmitting the ar-
ticulate voice over an electric circuit by talking
against a diaphragm placed in front of an electro-
magnet. But after Mr. Bell brought out the tele-
phone Mr. Edison made some remarkable improve-
ments.

In the year 1875 Edison took up the study of
harmonic telegraphs, in addition to his other work,
with the idea of developing a system of multiple
transmission by sending sound waves over an electric
circuit.

One of the devices he then made is illustrated in
an interesting drawing on file at the Orange Labora-
tory, entitled ''First Telephone on Record." This
device is described by Edison in a caveat filed in the
Patent Office January 14, 1876, a month before Bell
filed his application for patent.

Mr. Edison states, however, that while this device
was crudely capable of use as a magneto telephone,
he did not invent it for transmitting speech, but
as an apparatus for analyzing the complex waves
arising from various sounds. He did not try the
effects of sound waves produced by the human voice
until after Bell's discovery was announced, but then

117

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

found that this device was capable of use as a tele-
phone.

This was a curious coincidence, but it must be
understood that Mr. Edison in his testimony and
public utterances has always given Mr. Bell full
credit for the original discovery of transmitting ar-
ticulate speech over an electric circuit.

In order to understand the value of Edison's work
in this field it should be stated that, while Bell's tele-
phone transmitted speech and other sounds, it was
only practicable for short lines. Bell had no separate
transmitter, but used a single apparatus both as
transmitter and receiver. This instrument was simi-
lar to the receiver used to-day, having a metallic
diaphragm placed near the pole of a magnet. The
vibrations of the diaphragm induced very weak elec-
tric impulses in the magnetic coil. These impulses
passed over the line to the receiving end, energizing
the magnet coil there, and, by varying the magnet-
ism, caused the receiving diaphragm to be similarly
vibrated, and thus reproduce the sounds. Under such
conditions the telephone would be practicable upon
lines of only a few miles in extent, as the amount of
power generated by the human voice is necessarily
quite limited.

The Western Union Company requested Edison
to experiment on the telephone so that it would be
commercially practicable. He then went to work
with a corps of helpers, and, after m.onths of hard
work day and night and the performance of many
thousands of experiments, invented the carbon trans-
mitter.

ii8

THE TELEPHONE

This, with his plan of using an induction coil and
constant battery current on the line, were the needed
elements of success, and it made the telephone a
commercial possibility. Every one of the many
millions of telephones in use all over the world to-
day bears the imprint of Edison's genius in the em-
ployment of the principles he then established.

What Edison accomplished was this : Instead of
using one single apparatus for transmitting and re-
ceiving, he made a separate transmitter of special
design. In this he used carbon, which varies in elec-
trical resistance with the pressure applied. The car-
bon was an electrode in connection with the vibrating
diaphragm, and was in a closed circuit through
which flowed a battery current. The vibrations of
the diaphragm caused variations of pressure on the
carbon and consequent variations in the current.
These in turn resulted in corresponding impulses in
the receiving magnet, and the diaphragm of the re-
ceiver was vibrated accordingly, thus reproducing
the sounds. Edison's plan also included the passing
of the current through an induction coil, the sec-
ondary of which was connected with the main line.
By this means electrical impulses of enormously high
potential are sent out on the main line to the receiv-
ing end.

Thus it will be seen that with Bell's telephone the
sound-waves themselves generate the electric im-
pulses, which are hence extremely weak. With
Edison's telephone the sound-waves actuate an elec-
tric valve, so to speak, and permit variations in a
current of any desired strength.

119

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

Mr. Edison's own story of his telephone work is
full of interest: *'In 1876 I started again to experi-
ment for the Western Union and Mr. Orton. This
time it was the telephone. Bell invented the first
telephone, which consisted of the present receiver,
used both as a transmitter and a receiver (the mag-
neto type). It was attempted to introduce it com-
mercially, but it failed on account of its faintness
and the extraneous sounds which came in on its wire
from various causes. Mr. Orton wanted me to take
hold of it and make it commercial. As I had also
been working on a telegraph system employing tun-
ing-forks, simultaneously with both Bell and Gray,
I was pretty familiar with the subject. I started in,
and soon produced the carbon transmitter, which is
now universally used.

''Tests were made between New York and Phila-
delphia, also between New York and Washington,
using regular Western Union wires. The noises
were so great that not a word could be heard with
the Bell receiver when used as a transmitter between
New York and Newark, New Jersey. Mr. Orton
and W. K. Vanderbilt and the board of directors
witnessed and took part in the tests of my transmit-
ter. They were successful. The Western Union
then put the transmitters on private lines. Mr. Theo-
dore Puskas, of Budapest, Hungary, was the first
man to suggest a telephone exchange, and soon after
exchanges were established. The telephone depart-
ment was put in the hands of Hamilton McK.
Twombly, Vanderbilt's ablest son-in-law, who made
a success of it. The Bell Company, of Boston, also

120

THE TELEPHONE

started an exchange, and the fight was on, the West-
ern Union pirating the Bell receiver and the Boston
company pirating the Western Union transmitter.
About this time I wanted to be taken care of. I
threw out hints of this desire. Then Mr. Orton
sent for me. He had learned that inventors didn't
do business by the regular process, and concluded he
would close it right up. He asked me how much
I wanted. I had made up my mind it was certainly
worth twenty-five thousand dollars if it ever
amounted to anything for central station w^ork; so
that was the sum I had in mind to obstinately stick to
and get. Still it had been an easy job, and only re-
quired a few months, and I felt a little shaky and
uncertain. So I asked him to make me an offer.
He promptly said he would give me one hundred
thousand dollars. 'All right,' I said, *it is yours on
one condition, and that is that you do not pay it all
at once, but pay me at the rate of six thousand dol-
lars a year for seventeen years — the life of the pat-
ent.' He seemed only too pleased to do this, and it
was closed. My ambition was about four times
too large for my business capacity, and I knew that
I would soon spend this money experimenting if I
got it all at once; so I fixed it that I couldn't. I
saved seventeen years of worry by this stroke."

Edison continued his telephone work through a
number of years and made and tested many other
kinds of telephones, such as the water telephone,
electrostatic telephone, condenser telephone, chemi-
cal telephone, various magneto telephones, inertia

121

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

telephone, mercury telephone, voltaic pile telephone,
musical transmitter, and the electromotograph.

The principle of the electromotograph was uti-
lized by him in more ways than one; first of all in
telegraphy. Soon after the time he had concluded
the telephone arrangement just mentioned a patent
was issued to a Mr. Page. This patent was con-
sidered very important. It related to the use of a
retractile spring to withdraw the armature lever
from the magnet of a telegraph or other relay or
sounder, and thus controlled the art of telegraphy,
except in simple circuits.

* There was no known way," remarks Edison,
"whereby this patent could be evaded, and its pos-
sessor would eventually control the use of what is
known as the relay and sounder, and this was vital
to telegraphy. Gould was pounding the Western
Union on the Stock Exchange, disturbing its rail-
road contracts, and, being advised by his lawyers
that this patent was of great value, bought it. The
moment Mr. Orton heard this he sent for me and
explained the situation, and wanted me to go to work
immediately and see if I couldn't evade it or discover
some other means that could be used in case Gould
sustained the patent. It seemed a pretty hard job,
because there was no known means of moving a
lever at the other end of a telegraph wire except by
the use of a magnet. I said I would go at it that
night. In experimenting some years previously I
had discovered a very peculiar phenomenon, and that
was that if a piece of metal connected to a battery
was rubbed over a moistened piece of chalk resting

122

THE MOTOGRAPH

on a metal connected to the other pole, when the
current passed the friction was greatly diminished.
When the current was reversed the friction was
greatly increased over what it was when no current
was passing. Remembering this, I substituted a
piece of chalk, rotated by a small electric motor for
the magnet, and connecting a sounder to a metallic
finger resting on the chalk, the combination claim of
Page was made worthless. A hitherto unknown
means was introduced in the electric art. Two or
three of the devices were made and tested by the
company's expert. Mr. Orton, after he had had me
sign the patent application and got it in the Patent
Office, wanted to settle for it at once. He asked my
price. Again I said, 'Make me an offer.' Again he
named one hundred thousand dollars. I accepted,
providing he would pay it at the rate of six thou-
sand dollars a year for seventeen years. This was
done, and thus, with the telephone money, I received
twelve thousand dollars yearly for that period from
the Western Union Telegraph Company."

A year or two later the electromotograph principle
was again made use of in a curious manner. The
telephone was being developed in England, and Edi-
son had made arrangements with Colonel Gouraud,
his old associate in the automatic telegraph, to rep-
resent his interests.

A company was formed, a large number of instru-
ments were made and sent to London, and prospects
were bright. Then there came a threat of litigation
from the owners of the Bell patent, and Gouraud
found he could not push the enterprise unless he

123

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

could avoid using what was asserted to be an in-
fringement of the Bell receiver.

He cabled for help to Edison, who sent back word
telling him to hold the fort. "I had recourse again,"
says Edison, "to the phenomenon discovered by me
some years previous, that the friction of a rubbing
electrode passing over a moist chalk surface was
varied by electricity. I devised a telephone receiver
which was afterward known as the 'loud-speaking
telephone,' or 'chalk receiver.' There was no mag-
net, simply a diaphragm and a cylinder of com-
pressed chalk about the size of a thimble. A thin
spring connected to the center of the diaphragm ex-
tended outwardly and rested on the chalk cylinder,
and was pressed against it with a pressure equal to
that which would be due to a weight of about six
pounds. The chalk was rotated by hand. The vol-
ume of sound was very great. A person talking into
the carbon transmitter in New York had his voice
so amplified that he could be heard one thousand
feet away in an open field at Menlo Park. This
great excess of power was due to the fact that the
latter came from the person turning the handle. The
voice, instead of furnishing all the power, as with
the present receiver, merely controlled the power,
just as an engineer working a valve would control
a powerful engine.

'T made six of these receivers and sent them in
charge of an expert on the first steamer. They were
welcomed and tested, and shortly afterward I
shipped a hundred more. At the same time I was
ordered to send twenty young men, after teaching

124

THE MOTOGRAPH

them to become expert. I set up an exchange of ten
instruments around the laboratory. I would then go
out and get each one out of order in every conceiv-
able way, cutting the wires of one, short-circuiting
another, destroying the adjustment of a third, put-
ting dirt between the electrodes of a fourth, and so
on. A man would be sent to each to find out the
trouble. When he could find the trouble ten con-
secutive times, using five minutes each, he was sent
to London. About sixty men were sifted to get
twenty. Before all had arrived, the Bell Company
there, seeing we could not be stopped, entered into
negotiations for consolidation. One day I received
a cable from Gouraud ofiFering 'thirty thousand' for
my interest. I cabled back I would accept. When
the draft came I was astonished to find it was for
thirty thousand pounds. I had thought it was
dollars.'^

After the consolidation of the Bell and Edison
interests in England the chalk receiver was finally
abandoned in favor of the Bell receiver — the latter
being more simple and cheaper. Extensive litigation
with newcomers into the telephone field followed,
and Edison's carbon transmitter patent was sustained
by the English courts, while Bell's was declared
invalid.

In America, the competition between the Western
Union and Bell companies, which had been keen and
strenuous, was finally brought to an end under an
agreement, the former company agreeing to retire
from the telephonic field and the latter company
agreeing to stay out of the telegraphic field. Through

125

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDTSON

its ownership of Edison's carbon transmitter inven-
tion, the Western Union company came to enjoy
an annual income of several hundred thousand dol-
lars for some years as a com])ensation for its re-
tirement from telephony under this agreement.

The principle involved in Edison's carbon-trans-
mitter gave birth to another interesting device called
the microphone, by means of which die faintest
sounds could be very plainly heard. For instance,
the footsteps of a common house-fly make a loud
noise when the hearing is assisted by the micro-
phone. As every one knows, the microphone is uni-
versally used in our modern radio.

This invention was claimed at the time for Pro-
fessor Hughes, of England. Whatever credit might
be due to him for the form he proposed, a standard
history ascribes two original forms of the micro-
phone to Edison, and he himself remarks: ''After
I sent one of my men over to London especially to
show Preece the carbon transmitter, when Hughes
first saw it, and heard it — then within a month he
came out with the microphone, without any acknowl-
edgment whatever. Published dates will show that
Hughes came along after me.''

The carbon transmitter has not been the only way
in which Edison has utilized the peculiar property
that carbon possesses of altering its resistance to
the passage of current according to the degree of
pressure brought to bear on it.

For his quadruplex system he constructed a rheo-
stat, or resistance box, with a series of silk disks
saturated with plumbago and well dried. The pres-

126

THE MICROPHONE

sure on the disks can be regulated by an adjustable
screw, and in this way the resistance of the circuit
can be varied.

He also developed a "pressure," or carbon, relay,
by means of which signals of variable strength can
be transferred from one telegraphic circuit to an-
other. The poles of the electromagnet in the local
or relay circuit are hollowed out and filled up with
carbon disks or powdered plumbago.

If a weak current passes through the relay the
armature will be but feebly attracted and will only
compress the carbon slightly. Thus the carbon will
offer considerable resistance and the signal on the
local sounder will be weak.

If, on the contrary, the incoming current be
strong, the armature will be strongly attracted, the
carbon will be more compressed, thus lowering the
resistance and giving a loud signal on the local
sounder.

Another beautiful and ingenious use of carbon
was made by Edison in an instrument invented by
him called the tasimeter. This device was used for
indicating most minute degrees of heat, and was so
exceedingly sensitive that in one case the heat of
rays of light from the remote star Arcturus showed
results.

The tasimeter is a very simple instrument. A
strip of hard rubber rests vertically on a platinum
plate, beneath which is a carbon button, under which
again lies another platinum plate. The two plates
and the carbon button form part of an electric circuit
containing a battery and a galvanometer. Hard

127

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

rubber is very sensitive to heat, and the slightest rise
of temperature causes it to expand, thus increasing
the pressure on the carbon button. This produces
a variation in resistance shown by the swinging of
the galvanometer needle.

This instrument is so sensitive that with a delicate
galvanometer the heat of a person's hand thirty feet
away will throw the needle off the scale.

128

XII

MAKING A MACHINE TALK

IF ONE had never heard a phonograph, it would
seem as though it would be impossible to take
some pieces of metal and make a machine that would
repeat speaking, singing, or instrumental music just
like life.

So, before the autumn of 1877, when Edison in-
vented the phonograph, the world thought such a
thing was entirely out of the question. Indeed,
Edison's own men in his workshop, who had seen
him do some wonderful things, thought the idea was
absurd when he told them that he was making a
machine to reproduce human speech.

One of his men went so far as to bet him a box of
cigars that the thing would be an utter failure when
finished, but, as every one knows, Edison won the
bet, for the very first time the machine was tried
it repeated clearly all the words that were spoken
into it.

A story has often been told in the newspapers that
the invention was made through Edison's finger
being pricked by a point attached to a vibrating tele-
phone diaphragm, but this is not true.

The invention was not made through any accident,
but was the result of pure reasoning, and in this
case, as in many others, fact is more wonderful than

129

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

fiction. Mr. Edison's own account of the inven-
tion of the phonograph is intensely interesting.

"I was experimenting," he says, "on an automatic
method of recording telegraph messages on a disk of
paper laid on a revolving platen, exactly the same as
the disk talking-machine of to-day. The platen had
a spiral groove on its surface, like the disk. Over
this was placed a circular disk of paper; an electro-
magnet with the embossing point connected to an
arm travelled over the disk, and any signals given
through the magnets were embossed on the disk of
paper. If this disk was removed from the machine
and put on a similar machine provided with a contact
point the embossed record would cause the signals to
be repeated into another wire. The ordinary speed
of telegraphic signals is thirty-five to forty words a
minute ; but with this machine several hundred words
were possible.

*Trom my experiments on the telephone I knew
of the power of a diaphragm to take up sound vibra-
tions, as I had made a little toy which when you
recited loudly in the funnel would work a pawl con-
nected to the diaphragm; and this, engaging a
ratchet-wheel, served to give continuous rotation to
a pulley. This pulley was connected by a cord to a
little paper toy representing a man sawing wood.
Hence, if one shouted: 'Mary had a little lamb,'
etc., the paper man would start sawing wood. I
reached the conclusion that if I could record the
movements of the diaphragm properly I could cause
such records to reproduce the original movements
imparted to the diaphragm by the voice, and thus

130

MAKING A MACHINE TALK

succeed in recording and reproducing the human
voice.

''Instead of using a disk I designed a Httle ma-
chine, using a cyHnder provided with grooves around
the surface. Over this was to be placed tin-foil,
which easily received and recorded the movements
of the diaphragm. A sketch was made, and the
piecework price, eighteen dollars, was marked on the
sketch. I was in the habit of marking the price I
would pay on each sketch. If the workman lost,
I would pay his regular wages ; if he made more than
the wages, he kept it. The workman who got the
sketch was John Kruesi. I didn't have much faith
that it would work, expecting that I might possibly
hear a word or so that would give hope of a future
for the idea. Kruesi, when he had nearly finished it,
asked what it was for. I told him I was going to
record talking, and then have the machine talk
back. He thought it absurd. However, it was
finished; the foil was put on; I then shouted 'Mary
had a little lamb,' etc. I adjusted the reproducer,
and the machine reproduced it perfectly. I was
never so taken back in my life. Everybody was
astonished. I was always afraid of things that
worked the first time. Long experience proved that
there were great drawbacks found generally before
they could be made commercial ; but here was some-
thing there was no doubt of."

No wonder that John Kruesi, as he heard the little
machine repeat the words that had been spoken into
it, ejaculated in an awe-stricken tone : "Mein Gott
im Himmel!" No wonder the "boys" joined hands

131

THE BOYS* LIFE OF EDISON

and danced around Edison, singing and shouting.
No wonder that Edison and his associates sat up
all night fixing and adjusting it so as to get better
and better results — reciting and singing and trying
one another's voices and listening with awe and
delight as the crude little machine repeated the words
spoken or sung into it.

The news quickly became public, and the news-
papers of the world published columns about this
wonderful invention. Mr. Edison was besieged with
letters from every part of the globe. Every one
wanted to hear this machine; and in order to satisfy
a universal demand for phonographs to be used for
exhibition purposes he had a number of them made
and turned them over to various individuals, who
exhibited them to great crowds around the country.
These were the machines in which the record was
made on a sheet of tin-foil laid around the cylinder.

They created great excitement both in America
and abroad. The announcement of a phonograph
concert was sufficient to fill a hall with people who
were curious to hear a machine talk and sing.

In the next year, 1878, Edison entered upon his
experiments in electric lighting. His work in this
field kept him intensely busy for nearly ten years,
and the phonograph was laid aside as far as he was
concerned.

He had not forgotten it, however, for he had
fully realized its tremendous possibilities very
quickly after its invention. This is shown by an
article he wrote for the North American Review,
which appeared in the summer of 1878. In that

132

MAKING A MACHINE TALK

article he predicted the possible uses of the phono-
graph, many of which have since been fulfilled.

In 1887, having finished the greatest part of his
work on the electric light, he turned to the phono-
graph once more. Realizing that the tin-foil ma-
chine was not an ideal type and could not come into
common use, he determined to re-design it, and
make it an instrument that could be handled by any
one.

This meant the design and construction of an en-
tirely different type of machine, and resulted in the
kind of phonograph with which every one is famil-
iar in these modern days. One of the chief differ-
ences was the use of a wax cylinder instead of tin-
foil, and, instead of indenting with a pointed stylus,
the record is cut into the wax with a tiny sapphire,
the next hardest jewel to a diamond.

Into his improvements of the phonograph Mr.
Edison has put an enormous amount of time and
work. He has never lost interest, but has worked on
it more or less through all the intervening years up
to the present time. Even during recent years he
has expended a prodigious amount of energy in im-
proving the reproducer and other parts, spending
night after night, and frequently all night, at the
laboratory.

Inasmuch as great quantities of phonographs were
sold, requiring millions of records, one of the diffi-
culties to be overcome was to make large numbers
of duplicates from an original record made by a
singer, speaker, or band of musicians.

This difficulty will be perceived when it is stated

133

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

that the record cut into the wax cylinder is hardly
ever greater than one-thousandth of an inch deep,
which is less than the thickness of a sheet of tissue
paper, and in a single phonograph record there are
many millions of sound-waves so recorded.

Through endless experiments of Edison and his
working force, and with many ingenious inventions,
however, these difficulties were overcome one by
one.

It may be added that the phonograph was an
invention so absolutely new that when Mr. Edison
applied for his original patent, in 1877, the Patent
Office could not find that any such attempt had
ever before been made to record and reproduce
speech or other sounds, and the patent was granted
immediately. He has since taken out more than
one hundred patents on improvements.

The original patent has long since expired, and
many kinds of talking-machines are now made by
others also, but they all operate on the identical
principle which Edison was the first to discover and
put into actual practice.

134

XIII

A NEW LIGHT IN THE WORLD

IN THESE modern times an incandescent electric
lamp is such an every-day affair as to be a
familiar object even to a small child. But only a
few years ago — a little over thirty — the man who
proposed and invented it was derided in the news-
papers, and called a madman and a dreamer.

If among Edison's numerous inventions there
should be selected one or a class that might be
considered the greatest, it seems to be universal
opinion that the palm would be awarded to the
incandescent lamp and his complete system for the
distribution of electric light, heat, and power. These
inventions as a class, and what has sprung from
them, have brought about most wonderful changes
in the world.

The year 1877 was a busy one at Edison's labora-
tory at Menlo Park. He was engaged on the tele-
phone, on acoustic electric transmission, sextuplex
telegraphs, duplex telegraphs, miscellaneous carbon
articles, and other things. He also commenced ex-
perimenting on the electric light.

Besides, as we have seen in the previous chapter,
he invented the phonograph. The great interest
and excitement caused by the latter invention took
up nearly all of his time and attention for many

135

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

months, and, indeed, up to July, 1878. He then
took a vacation and went out to Wyoming with a
party of astronomers to observe an edipse of the
sun and to make a test of his tasimeter.

He was absent about two months, coming home
rested and refreshed. Mr. Edison says : "After my
return from the trip to observe the ecHpse of the sun
I went with Professor Barker, professor of physics
in the University of Pennsylvania, and Dr. Chan-
dler, professor of chemistry in Columbia College, to
see Mr. Wallace, a large manufacturer of brass in
Ansonia, Connecticut. Wallace at this time was
experimenting on series arc lighting. Just at that
time I wanted to take up something new, and Pro-
fessor Barker suggested that I go to work and see
if I could subdivide the electric light so it could be
got in small units like gas. This was not a new
suggestion, because I had made a number of ex-
periments on electric lighting a year before this.
They had been laid aside for the phonograph. I
determined to take up the search again and continue
it. On my return home I started my usual course
of collecting every kind of data about gas; bought
all the transactions of the gas engineering societies,
etc., all the back volumes of gas journals, etc. Hav-
ing obtained all the data, and investigated gas-jet
distribution in New York by actual observations, I
made up my mind that the problem of the subdivi-
sion of the electric current could be solved and made
commercial.*'

The problem which Edison had undertaken to
solve was a gigantic one. The arc light was then

136

A NEW LIGHT IN THE WORLD

known and in use to a very small extent, but the
subdivision of the electric light — as it was then
called — had not been accomplished. It had been the
dream of scientists and inventors for a long time.

Innumerable trials and experiments had been made
in America and Europe for many years, but with-
out success. Although a great number of ingenious
lamps had been made by the foremost inventors of
the period, they were utterly useless as part of a
scheme for a system of electric lighting. In fact,
these efforts had been so unsuccessful that many of
the leading scientists of the time, even as late as
1879, declared that the subdivision of the light was
an impossibility.

The chief trouble was that the early experimenters
did not conceive the idea of a system, and worked
only on a lamp. They all seemed to have the idea
that an electric lamp was the main thing and that
it should be of low resistance and should be operated
on a current of very low voltage, or pressure. They,
therefore experimented on lamps using short carbon
rods or strips for burners, which required a large
quantity of current.

Electric lighting with this kind of lamp was in-
deed a practical impossibility. The quantity of cur-
rent required for a large number of them would
have been prodigious, giving rise to tremendous
problems on account of the heating effects. Besides,
the most fatal objection was the cost of copper for
conductors, which for a city section of about half a
mile square would have cost not less than a hundred

137

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

million dollars, on account of the enormous quan-
tity of current that would be required.

Mr. Edison realized at the beginning that previous
experimenters had failed because they had been fol-
lowing the wrong track. He knew that electric
lighting could not be a success unless it could be
sold to the public at a reasonable price and pay a
profit to those who supplied it. With such lamps
as had been proposed, requiring such an enormous
outlay for copper, this would have been impossible.
Besides, there would not have been enough copper in
the world to supply conductors for one large city.

Edison did what he has so often done before and
since. He turned about and went in the opposite
direction. He reasoned that in order to develop a
successful system of electric lighting the cost of con-
ductors must come within very reasonable limits.
To insure this, he must invent a lamp of compara-
tively high resistance, requiring only a small quantity
of current, and with a burner having a small radiat-
ing surface.

Having the problem clearly in mind, Edison went
to work in the fall of 1878 with that enthusiastic
energy so characteristic of him. His earliest ex-
periments were made with carbon as the burner for
his lamp. In the previous year he had also experi-
mented on this line, beginning with strips of carbon
burned in the open air, and then in vacuo by means
of a hand-worked air-pump. These strips burned
only a few minutes. On resuming his work in 1878
he again commenced with carbon, and made a very
large number of trials, all in vacuo. Not only did

138

A NEW LIGHT IN THE WORLD

he try ordinary strips of carbonized paper, but tissue-
paper coated with tar and lampblack was rolled into
thin sticks, like knitting-needles, carbonized and
raised to the white heat of incandescence in vacuo.

He also tried hard carbon, wood carbon, and
almost every conceivable variety of paper carbon
in like manner. But with the best vacuum that he
could then get by means of the ordinary hand-pump
the carbons would last at the most only from ten to
fifteen minutes in a state of incandescence.

It was evident to Edison that such results as these
were not of commercial value. He feared that, after
all, carbon was not the ideal substance he had
thought it was for an incandescent lamp-burner.
The lamp that he had in mind was one which should
have a tough, hair-like filament for a light-giving
body that could be maintained at a white heat for
a thousand hours before breaking.

He therefore turned his line of experiments to
wires made of refractory metals, such as platinum
and iridium, and their alloys. These metals have
very high fusing points, and while they would last
longer than the carbon strips, they melted with a
slight excess of current after they had been lighted
but a short time.

Nevertheless, Edison continued to experiment
along this line, making some improvements, until
about April, 1879, ^^ made an important discovery
which led him to the first step toward the modern
incandescent lamp. He discovered that if he intro-
duced a piece of platinum wire into an all-glass
globe, completely sealed and highly exhausted of air,

139

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

and passed a current through the platinum wire while
the vacuum was being made the wire would give
a light equal to twenty-five candle-power without
melting. Previously, the same length of wire would
melt in the open air when giving a light equal to
four candles.

He thus discovered that the passing of current
through the platinum while the vacuum was being
obtained would drive out occluded gases (i.e., gases
mechanically held in or upon the metal). This was
important and soon led to greater results.

Edison and his associates had been working night
and day at the Menlo Park laboratory, and now that
promising results were ahead their efforts went on
with greater vigor than ever. Taking no account
of the passage of time, with an utter disregard of
meal-times, and with but scanty hours of sleep
snatched reluctantly at odd periods, Edison labored
on, and the laboratory was kept going without
cessation.

Following up the progress he had made, Edison
made improvement after improvement, especially in
the line of high vacua, and about the beginning of
October had so improved his pumps that he could
produce a vacuum up to the one-millionth part of
an atmosphere. It should be understood that the
maintaining of such a high vacuum was only ren-
dered possible by Edison's invention of a one-piece
all-glass globe, hermetically sealed during its manu-
facture into a lamp.

In obtaining this perfection of vacuum apparatus
Edison realized that he was drawing nearer to a

140

A NEW LIGHT IN THE WORLD

solution of the problem. For many reasons, how-
ever, he was dissatisfied with platino-iridium fila-
ments for burners, and went back to carbon, which
from the first he had thought of as an ideal sub-
stance for a burner.

His next step proved that he was correct. On
October 21, 1879, after many patient trials, he
carbonized a piece of cotton sewing-thread bent into
a loop or horseshoe form, and had it sealed into a
glass globe from which he exhausted the air until
a vacuum up to one-millionth of an atmosphere was
produced. This lamp, when put on the circuit,
lighted up brightly to incandescence and maintained
its integrity for over forty hours, and lo ! the prac-
tical incandescent lamp was born. The impossible,
so called, had been attained ; subdivision of the elec-
tric current was made practicable ; the goal had been
reached, and one of the greatest inventions of the
century was completed.

Edison and his helpers stayed by the lamp during
the whole forty hours watching it, some of the men
making bets as to how long it would burn. It may
well be imagined that there was great jubilation
throughout the laboratory during those two days of
delight and anxiety.

But now that the principle was established work
was renewed with great fervor in making other
lamps. A vast number of experiments were made
with carbons made of paper, and the manufacture
of lamps with these paper carbons was carried on
continuously. A great number of these were made
and put into actual use.

141

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

Edison was not satisfied, however. He wanted
something better. He began to carbonize every-
thing that he could lay hands on. In his laboratory
note-books are innumerable jottings of the things
that were carbonized and tried, such as tissue-paper,
soft paper, all kinds of cardboards, drawing paper
of all grades, paper saturated with tar, all kinds of
threads, fish-line, threads rubbed with tarred lamp-
black, fine threads plaited together in strands, cotton
soaked in boiling tar, lamp-wick, twine, tar and
lampblack mixed with a proportion of lime, vulcan-
ized fiber, celluloid, boxwood, cocoanut hair and
shell, spruce, hickory, baywood, cedar, and maple
shavings, rosewood, punk, cork, bagging, flax, and a
host of other things.

He also extended his searches far into the realms
of nature in the line of grasses, plants, canes, and
similar products, and in these experiments at that
time and later he carbonized, made into lamps, and
tested no fewer than six thousand different species
of vegetable growths.

At this time Edison was investigating everything
with a microscope. One day he picked up a palm-
leaf fan and examined the long strip of cane bind-
ing on its edge. He gave it to one of his assistants,
telling him to cut it up into filaments, carbonize
them, and put them into lamps.

These proved to be the best thus far obtained, and
on further examination Edison decided that he had
now found the best material so far tried, and a mate-
rial entirely suitable for his lamps.

Within a very short time he sent a man off to
142

A NEW LIGHT IN THE WORLD

China and Japan to search for bamboo, with instruc-
tions to keep on sending samples until the right one
was found. This man did his work well, and among
the species of bamboo he sent was one that was
found satisfactory. Mr. Edison obtained a quantity
of this and arranged with a farmer in Japan to
grow it for him and to ship regular supplies. This
was done for a number of years, and during that
time millions of Edison lamps were regularly made
from that particular species of Japanese bamboo.

Mr. Edison did not stop at this, however. He
was continually in search of the best, and sent other
men out to Cuba, Florida, and all through South
America to hunt for something that might be su-
perior to what he was using. Another man was
sent on a trip around the world for the same purpose.

Some of these explorers met with striking adven-
tures during their travels, and all of them sent vast
quantities of bamboos, palms, and fibrous grasses to
the laboratory for examination, but Edison never
found any of them better for his purposes than
the bamboo from Japan.

In this remarkable exploration of the world for
such a material will be found an example of the
thoroughness of Edison's methods. He is not satis-
fied to believe he has the best until he has proved
it, and this search for the best bamboo was so thor-
ough that it cost him altogether about one hundred
thousand dollars.

In the meantime he was experimenting to manu-
facture an artificial filament that would be better
than bamboo. He finally succeeded in his eflforts,

143

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

and brought out what is known as a "squirted" fila-
ment. This was made of a cellulose mixture and
pressed out in the form of a thread through dies.
This kind of filament has gradually superseded the
bamboo in the manufacture of lamps.

We have been obliged to confine ourselves to a
very brief outline history of the invention and de-
velopment of the incandescent lamp. To tell the
detailed story of the intense labors of the inventor
and his staff of faithful workers would require a
volume as large as the present one.

All that could be done in the space at our dis-
posal was to try and give the reader a general idea
of the clear thinking, logical reasoning, endless ex-
perimenting, hard work, and thoroughness of
method of Edison in the creation of a new art.

144

XIV

MENLO PARK

IN THE history of the world's progress, Menlo
Park, New Jersey, will ever be famous as the
birthplace of the carbon transmitter, the phonograph,
the incandescent lamp, the commercial dynamo, and
the fundamental systems of distributing electric
light, heat, and power.

In this list might also be included the electric
railway, for while others had previously made some
progress in this direction, it was in this historic spot
that Edison did his pioneer work that advanced the
art to a stage of practicability.

The name of Menlo Park will not have as striking
a significance to the younger readers as to their
elders whose recollections carry them back to the
years between 1876 and 1886. During that period
the place became invested with the glamor of ro-
mance by reason of the many startling and wonder-
ful inventions coming out of it from time to time.

Edison worked there during these ten years. He
had adopted Invention as a profession. As we have
seen, he had always had a passion for a laboratory.
Thus, from the little cellar at Port Huron, from the
scant shelves in a baggage car, from the nooks and
corners of dingy telegraph offices, and the grimy
little shops in New York and Newark, he had come

145

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

to the proud ownership of a real laboratory where
he could wrestle with Nature for her secrets.

Here he could experiment to his heart's content,
and invent on a bolder and larger scale than ever
before. All the world knows that he did.

Menlo Park was the merest hamlet, located a few
miles below Elizabeth. Besides the laboratory build-
ings, it had only a few houses, the best-looking of
which Edison lived in. Two or three of the others
were occupied by the families of members of his
staff ; in the others boarders were taken.

During the ten years that Edison occupied his
laboratory there, life in Menlo Park could be
summed up in one short word — work. Through the
days and through the nights, year in and year out,
for the most part, he and his associates labored on
unceasingly, snatching only a few hours of sleep
here and there when tired nature positively de-
manded it. Such a scene of concentrated and fruit-
ful activity the world has probably never seen.

The laboratory buildings consisted of the labora-
tory proper, the library and office, a machine shop,
carpenter shop, and some smaller buildings, and,
later on, a wooden building, which was used for a
short time as an incandescent lamp factory.

Here Edison worked through those busy years,
surrounded by a band of chosen assistants, whose
individual abilities and never-failing loyalty were of
invaluable aid to him in accomplishing the purposes
that he had in mind.

As to these associates, we quote Mr. Edison's
own words from an autobiographical article in the

146

MENLO PARK

Electrical World of March 5, 1904: 'It is interest-
ing to note that in addition to those mentioned above
(Charles Batchelor and Francis R. Upton), I had
around me other men who ever since have remained
active in the field, such as Messrs. Francis Jahl, Wil-
Ham J. Hammer, Martin Force, Ludwig K. Boehm,
not forgetting that good friend and co-worker, the
late John Kruesi. They found plenty to do in the
various developments of the art, and as I now look
back I sometimes wonder how we did so much in so
short a time.'*

To this roll of honor may be added the names
of a few others : The Carman brothers, Stockton
L. Griffin, Dr. A. Haid, John F. Ott (still with
Mr. Edison at Orange), John W. Lawson, Edward
H. Johnson, Charles L. Clarke, William Holzer,
James Hippie, Charles T. Hughes, Samuel D. Mott,
Charles T. Mott, E. G. Acheson, Dr. E. L. Nichols,
J. H. Vail, W. S. Andrews, and Messrs. Worth,
Crosby, Herrick, Hill, Isaacs, Logan, and Swanson.

To these should be added the name of Mr. Sam-
uel Insull, who, in 1881, became Mr. Edison's pri-
vate secretary, and who for many years afterward
managed all his business affairs.

Mr. InsuU's position as secretary in the Menlo
Park days was not a ''soft snap," as his own words
will show. He says : "I never attempted to systema-
tize Edison's business life. Edison's whole method
of work would upset the system of any office. He
was just as likely to be at work in his laboratory at
midnight as midday. He cared not for the hours
of the day or the days of the week. If he was ex-

147

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

hausted he might more Hkely be asleep in the middle
of the day than in the middle of the night, as most
of his work in the way of invention was done at
night. I used to run his office on as close business
methods as my experience admitted, and I would
get at him whenever it suited his convenience.
Sometimes he would not go over his mail for days
at a time, but other times he would go regularly
to his office in the morning. At other times my
engagements used to be with him to go over his
business affairs at Menlo Park at night, if I was
occupied in New York during the day. In fact,
as a matter of convenience I used more often to get
at him at night as it left my days free to transact
his affairs, and enabled me, probably at a midnight
luncheon, to get a few minutes of his time to look
over his correspondence and get his directions as to
what I should do in some particular negotiation or
matter of finance. While it was a matter of suiting
Edison's convenience as to when I should transact
business with him, it also suited my own ideas, as it
enabled me after getting through my business with
him to enjoy the privilege of watching him at his
work, and to learn something about the technical
side of matters. Whatever knowledge I may have
of the electric light and power industry I feel I owe
it to the tuition of Edison. He was about the most
willing tutor, and I must confess that he had to be
a patient one.*'

It must not be supposed that the hard work of
these times made life a burden to the small family
of laborers associated with Edison. On the contrary,

148

MENLO PARK

they were a cheerful, happy lot of men, always ready
to brighten up their strenuous life by the enjoyment
of anything of a humorous nature that came along.

Often during the long, weary nights of experi-
menting Edison would call a halt for refreshments,
which he had ordered always to be sent in at mid-
night when night work was in progress. Every-
thing would be dropped, all present would join in
the meal, and the last good story or joke would pass
around.

Mr. Jehl has written some recollections of this
period, in which he says : "Our lunch always ended
with a cigar, and I may mention here that although
Edison was never fastidious in eating, he always
relished a good cigar, and seemed to find in it con-
solation and solace. ... It often happened that
while we were enjoying the cigars after our mid-
night repast, one of the boys would start up a tune
on the organ and we would sing together, or one
of the others would give a solo. Another of the
boys had a voice that sounded like something be-
tween the ring of an old tomato-can and a pewter
jug. He had one song that he would sing while
we roared with laughter. He was also great in
imitating the tinfoil phonograph. When Boehm was
in good humor he would play his zither now and
then, and amuse us by singing pretty German songs.
On many of these occasions the laboratory was the
rendezvous of jolly and convivial visitors, mostly
old friends and acquaintances of Mr. Edison. Some
of the office employees would also drop in once in a
while, and, as every one present was always welcome

149

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

to partake of the midnight meal, we all enjoyed these
gatherings. After a while, when we were ready to
resume work, our visitors would intimate that they
were going home to bed, but we fellows could stay
up and work, and they would depart, generally
singing some song like 'Good-night, Ladies!' . . .
It often happened that when Edison had been work-
ing up to three or four o'clock in the morning he
would lie down on one of the laboratory tables, and
with nothing but a couple of books for a pillow,
would fall into a sound sleep. He said it did him
more good than being in a soft bed, which spoils
a man. Some of the laboratory assistants could be
seen now and then sleeping on a table in the early
morning hours. If their snoring became objection-
able to those still at work, the 'calmer' was applied.
This machine consisted of a Babbitt's soap-box with-
out a cover. Upon it was mounted a broad ratchet-
wheel with a crank, while into the teeth of the wheel
there played a stout, elastic slab of wood. The box
would be placed on the table where the snorer was
sleeping and the crank turned rapidly. The racket
thus produced was something terrible, and the sleeper
would jump up as though a typhoon had struck the
laboratory. The irrepressible spirit of humor in the
old days, although somewhat strenuous at times,
caused many a moment of hilarity which seemed to
refresh the boys, and enabled them to work with
renewed vigor after its manifestation."

The "boys" were ever ready for a joke on one
of their number. Mr. Mackenzie, who taught Edi-
son telegraphy, spent a great deal of time at the

150

MENLO PARK

laboratory. He had a bushy red beard, and was
persuaded to give a few hairs to be carbonized and
used for filaments in experimental lamps. When the
lamps were lighted the boys claimed that their bright-
ness was due to the rich color of the hairs.

The history of the busy years at Menlo Park
would make a long story if told in full, but only
a hint can be given here of the gradual development
of many important inventions. These include the
innumerable experiments on the lamp, on different
kinds and weights of iron for field magnets and
armatures, on magnetism, on windings and connec-
tions for field magnets and armatures, on distribu-
tion circuits, control, and regulation, and so on
through a long list.

All these things were new. There was nothing
in the books to serve as a guide in solving these
new problems, but Edison patiently worked them
out, one by one, until a complete system was the
result of his labors.

Menlo Park was historic in one other particular.
It was the very first place in the world to see in-
candescent electric lighting from a central station.

The newspapers had been so full of the wonder-
ful invention that there was a great demand to see
the new light. Edison decided to give a public
exhibition, and for this purpose put up over four
hundred lights in the streets and houses of Menlo
Park, all connected to underground conductors
which ran to the dynamos in one of the shop
buildings.

On New Year's Eve, 1879, the Pennsylvania

151

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

Railroad ran special trains, and over three thousand
people availed themselves of the opportunity to wit-
ness the demonstration. It was a great success, and
gave rise to a wide public interest.

Edison's laboratory at Menlo Park had never
suffered for lack of visitors, but now it became a
center of attraction for scientific and business men
from all parts of the world. Pages of this book
could be filled with the names of well-known visitors
at this period, but it would be of no practical use
to give them; besides we must now pass on to the
time when the light was introduced to the world.

152

XV

BEGINNING THE ELECTRIC LIGHT BUSINESS

THE close of the last two chapters found us at-
tending the birth of an art that was then
absolutely and entirely new — the art of electric
lighting by incandescent lamps. It will now be in-
teresting to take a brief glance at the way in which
it was introduced to the w^orld.

Edison invented not only a lamp and a dynamo,
but a complete system of distributing electric light,
heat, and power from central stations. This in-
cluded a properly devised network of conductors fed
with electricity from several directions and capable
of being tapped to supply current to each building;
a lamp that would be cheap, lasting, take little cur-
rent, be easy to handle, and each to be independent
of every other lamp ; means for measuring electricity
by meter ; means for regulating the current so that
every lamp, whether near to or far away from
the station, would give an equal light ; the designing
of new and efficient dynamos, with means for con-
necting and disconnecting and for regulating and
equalizing their loads ; the providing of devices that
would prevent fires from excessive current, and the
providing of switches, lamp-holders, fixtures, and
the like.

This was a large program to fill, for it was all

153

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

new, and there was nothing in the world from which
to draw ideas, but Edison carried out his scheme
in full, and much more besides. By the end of
1880 he was ready to launch his electric light sys-
tem for commercial use, and the Edison Electric
Light Company, that had been organized for the
purpose, rented a mansion at No. 65 Fifth Avenue,
New York, to be used for offices. Edison now
moved some of his Menlo Park staff into that city
to pursue the work.

Right at the very beginning a most serious dif-
ficulty was met with. None of the appliances neces-
sary for use in the lighting system could be
purchased anywhere in the world.

They were all new and novel — dynamos, switch-
boards, regulators, pressure and current indicators,
incandescent lamps, sockets, small switches, meters,
fixtures, underground conductors, junction boxes,
service boxes, manhole boxes, connectors, and even
specially made wire. Not one of these things was in
existence; and no outsider knew enough about such
devices to make them on order, except the wire.

Edison himself solved the difficulty by raising
some money and establishing several manufacturing
shops in which these articles could be made. The
first of all was a small factory at Menlo Park
to make the lamps, Mr. Upton taking charge of that
branch.

For making the dynamos he secured a large works
on Goerck Street, New York, and gave its manage-
ment to Mr. Batchelor. For the underground con-
ductors and their parts a building on Washington

154

THE ELECTRIC LIGHT

Street was rented and the work done under the su-
perintendence of Mr. Kruesi. In still another fac-
tory building there were made the smaller appliances,
such as sockets, switches, fixtures, meters, safety
fuses and other details. This latter plant was at first
owned by Mr. Sigmund Bergmann, who had worked
with Edison on telephones and phonographs, but
later Mr. Edison and E. H. Johnson became
partners.

Still another difficulty presented itself. There
were no men who knew how to do wiring for elec-
tric lights, except those who had been with Edison
at Menlo Park. This problem was solved by opening
a night-school at No. 65 Fifth Avenue in which a
large number of men were educated and trained
for the work by Edison's associates. Many of these
men have since become very prominent in electrical
circles.

Thus, in planning these matters, and in guiding
the operations in these four shops in New York,
and with all the work he was doing on new experi-
ments and inventions there and at Menlo Park, and
in making preparations for the first central station
in New York City, Edison was a prodigiously busy
man. He worked incessantly, and it is safe to say
that he did not average more than four hours' sleep
a day.

He was the center and the guiding spirit of those
intensely busy times. The aid of his faithful as-
sociates was invaluable in the building up of the
business, but he was the great central storehouse of
ideas, and it is owing to his undaunted courage,

155

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

energy, perseverance, knowledge and foresight, that
the foundations of so great an art have been so well
laid.

As has been well said by Major S. B. Eaton, who
was president and general manager of the Edison
Electric Light Company in its earliest years: "In
looking back on those days and scrutinizing them
through the years, I am impressed by the greatness,
the solitary greatness, I may say, of Mr. Edison.
We all felt then that we were of importance, and
that our contribution of effort and zeal was vital.
I can see now, however, that the best of us was
nothing but the fly on the wheel. Suppose any-
thing had happened to Edison? All would have
been chaos and ruin. To him, therefore, be the
glory, if not the profit."

Early in 1881 comparatively few people had seen
the incandescent light. In order to make the public
familiar with it, the Edison company equipped its
office building with fixtures and lamps, the latter
being lighted by current from a dynamo in the
cellar. In the evenings the house was thrown open
to visitors until ten or eleven o'clock. Thousands
of people flocked to see the new light, which in those
days was regarded as wonderful and mysterious, for
while the lamps gave a soft, steady illumination,
there was no open flame, practically no heat, no
danger of fire, and no vitiation of air. For the most
part of four years the writer spent his evenings re-
ceiving these visitors if no important business was
in progress at the moment.

Mr. Edison and his shops had scarcely time to

156

THE ELECTRIC LIGHT

get well on their feet before a rush of business
set in. How this business rapidly developed and
grew until it became of very great magnitude is
a matter of history, which we shall not attempt to
relate here.

Some idea of this wonderful development, as it
has gone on through the years that have passed since
1880, may be formed when it is stated that at this
time there are more than one hundred millions of
incandescent lamps in daily use in the United States
alone. Every one of these lamps and the funda-
mental principles upon which they are operated rest
upon the foundations which Edison laid so well.

One of Mr. Edison's interesting stories of the
early days relates to the making of the lamps. He
says:

'*When we first started the electric light we had
to have a factory for manufacturing lamps. As
the Edison light company did not seem disposed to
go into manufacturing, we started a small lamp
factory at Menlo Park with what money I could
raise from my other inventions and royalties and
some assistance. The lamps at that time were cost-
ing about one dollar and twenty-five cents each to
make, so I said to the company: 'If you will give
me a contract during the life of the patents I will
make all the lamps required by the company and
deliver them for forty cents.' The company jumped
at the chance of this ofi^er, and a contract was drawn
up. We then bought at a receiver's sale at Harrison,
New Jersey, a very large brick factory building
which had been used as an oil-cloth works. We got

157

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

it at a great bargain, and only paid a small sum
down, and the balance on mortgage. We moved the
lamp works from Menlo Park to Harrison. The
first year the lamps cost us about one dollar and
ten cents each. We sold them for forty cents; but
there were only about twenty or thirty thousand of
them. The next year they cost us about seventy
cents, and we sold them for forty. There were a
good many, and we lost more money the second
year than the first. The third year I succeeded in
getting up machinery and in changing the processes,
until it got down so that they cost somewhere
around fifty cents. I still sold them for forty cents,
and lost more money that year than any other, be-
cause the sales were increasing rapidly. The fourth
year I got it down to thirty-seven cents, and I made
all the money in one year that I had lost previously.
I finally got it down to twenty-two cents, and sold
them for forty cents; and they were made by the
million. Whereupon the Wall Street people thought
it was a very lucrative business, so they concluded
they w^ould like to have it, and bought us out.

**When w^e formed the works at Harrison we
divided the interests into one hundred shares or
parts at one hundred dollars par. One of the boys
was hard up after a time, and sold two shares to Bob
Cutting. Up to that time we had never paid any-
thing, but we got around to the point where the
board declared a dividend every Saturday night.
We had never declared a dividend when Cutting
bought his shares, and after getting his dividends
for three weeks in succession he called up on the

158

THE ELECTRIC LIGHT

telephone and wanted to know what kind of a con-
cern this was that paid a weekly dividend. The
works sold for $1,085,000."

We have been obliged to confine ourselves to a
very brief and general description of the beginnings
of the art of electric lighting, but this chapter would
not be complete without reference to Edison's
design and construction of the greatest dynamo that
had ever been made up to that time.

The earliest dynamos he made would furnish cur-
rent only for sixty lamps of sixteen candle-power
each. These machines were belted up to an engine
or countershaft. He realized that much larger
dynamos would be needed for central stations, and
in 1880 constructed one in Menlo Park, but it was
not entirely successful.

In the spring of 1881, however, he designed a
still larger one, to be connected direct to its own
engine and operated without belting. Its capacity
was to be twelve hundred lamps, instead of sixty.

At that time such a project was not dreamed of
outside the Edison laboratory, and once more he was
the subject of much ridicule and criticism by those
who were considered as experts. They said the
thing was impossible and absolutely impracticable.

Such opinions, however, have never caused a mo-
ment's hesitation to Edison when he has made up
his mind that a thing can be done. He calmly went
ahead with his plans, and although he found many
difficulties, he overcame them all. He worked the
shops night and day, until he had built this great
machine and operated it successfully.

159

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

The dynamo was finished in the summer of 1881.
At that time there was in progress an international
Electrical Exposition in Paris, at which Edison was
exhibiting his system of electric lighting. He had
promised to send this great dynamo over to Paris.

When the dynamo was finished and tested there
were only four hours to take it and the engine
apart and get all the parts on board the steamer.
Edison had foreseen all this, and had arranged to
have sixty men get to work all at once to take it
apart. Each man had written instructions just what
to do, and when the machine was stopped every man
did his own particular work and the job was quickly
accomplished.

Arrangements had been made with the police for
rapid passage through the streets from the shops to
the steamship. The trucks made quick time of it,
being preceded by a wagon with a clanging bell.
Street traffic was held up for them, just as it is
for engines and hose-carts going to a fire. The
dynamo and engine got safely down to the dock
without delay and were loaded on the steamer an
hour before she sailed.

This dynamo and engine weighed twenty-seven
tons, and was then, and for a long time after, the
eighth wonder of the scientific world. Its arrival
and installation in Paris were eagerly watched by
the most famous scientists and electricians in
Europe.

160

XVI

THE FIRST EDISON CENTRAL STATION

FROM the beginning of his experiments on the
electric light Edison had one idea ever in mind,
and that was to develop a system of lighting cities
from central stations. His plan was to supply elec-
tric light and power in much the same way that
gas is furnished.

He never forsook this idea for a moment. In-
deed, it formed the basis of all his plans, although
the scientific experts of the time predicted utter
failure. While the experiments were going on at
Menlo Park he had Mr. Upton and others at work
making calculations and plans for city systems.

Soon after he had invented the incandescent lamp
he began to take definite steps toward preparing
for the first central station in the city of New York.
After some consideration, he decided upon the dis-
trict included between Wall, Nassau, Spruce and
Ferry Streets, Peck Slip and the East River, cover-
ing nearly a square mile in extent.

He sent into this district a number of men, who
visited every building, counted every gas-jet and
found out how many hours per day or night they
were burned.

These men also ascertained the number of busi-
ness houses using power and how much they con-

i6i

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

sumed. All this information was marked in colored
inks on large maps, so that Edison could study the
question with all the details before him.

All this work had taken several months, but, with
this information to guide him, the main conductors
to be laid in the streets of this district were figured,
block by block, and the results were marked upon
the maps. It was found, however, that the quantity
of copper required for these conductors would be
exceedingly large and costly, and, if ever, Edison
was somewhat dismayed.

This difficulty only spurred him on to still greater
effort. Before long he solved the problem by in-
venting the ** feeder and main" system, for which
he signed an application for patent on August 4,
1880.

By this invention he saved seven-eighths of the
amount of copper previously required. So the main
conductors were figured again, at only one-eighth
the size they were before, and the results were
marked upon enormous new maps which were now
prepared for the actual installation.

It should be remembered that from the very start
Edison had determined that his conductors should
be placed underground. He knew that this was the
only method for permanent and satisfactory service
to the public.

Our young readers can scarcely imagine the con-
dition of New York streets at that time. They
were filled with lines of ugly wooden poles carrying
great masses of telegraph, telephone, stock ticker,
burglar alarm and other wires, in all conditions of

162

EDISON CENTRAL STATION

sag and decay. The introduction of the arc-lamp
added another series of wires which with their high
potentials carried a menace to life. Edison was the
first to put conductors underground, and the wis-
dom of so doing became so clear that a few years
later laws were made compelling others to do like-
wise.

But to return to our story. Just before Christmas
in 1880 the Edison Electric Illuminating Company
of New York was organized, and a license was
issued to it for the use of the Edison patents on
Manhattan Island.

The work for the new station now commenced
in real earnest. A double building at 255 and 257
Pearl Street was purchased, and the inside of one
half was taken out and a strong steel structure was
erected inside the walls.

Work on the maps and plans for the underground
network of conductors was continued at Menlo Park.
Mr. Edison started his factories for making dyna-
mos, lamps, underground conductors, sockets,
switches, meters, and other details. Thus, the wheels
of industry were humming merrily in preparation
for the installation of the system. Every detail re-
ceived Edison's personal care and consideration. He
had plenty of competent men, but he deemed nothing
too small or insignificant for his attention in this
important undertaking.

In the fall of 1881 the laying of the underground
conductors was begun and pushed forward with
frantic energy. Here again Edison left nothing to
chance. Although he had a thousand things to oc-

163

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

cupy his mind he also superintended this work. He
did not stand around and give orders, but worked
with the men in the trenches day and night helping
to lay tubes, filling up junction boxes, and taking
part in all the infinite detail.

He would work till he felt the need of a little
rest. Then he would go off to the station building
in Pearl Street, throw an overcoat on a pile of iron
tubes, lie down and sleep a few hours, rising to re-
sume work with the first gang.

It is worth pausing just a moment to glance at
this man taking a fitful rest on a pile of iron pipe
in a dingy building. His name is on the tip of
the world's tongue. Distinguished scientists from
every part of Europe seek him eagerly. He has
just been decorated and awarded high honors by the
French government. He is the inventor of wonder-
ful new apparatus and the exploiter of novel and
successful arts. The magic of his achievements and
the rumors of what is being done have caused a
wild drop in gas securities and a sensational rise in
his own electric-light stock from one hundred dollars
to thirty-five hundred a share. Yet these things
do not at all affect his slumber or his democratic
simplicity, for in that, as in everything else, he is
attending strictly to business, "doing the thing that
is next to him."

The laying of the underground conductors was
interrupted by frost in the winter of 1881, but in
the following spring the work was renewed with
great energy until there had been laid over eighty
thousand feet. In the mean time the buildings of

164

EDISON CENTRAL STATION

the district were being wired for lamps, and the
machine-works had been busy on the building of
three of the "Jumbo" d>Tiamos for the station.
These were larger than the great dynamo that had
been sent to Paris.

These three dynamos were installed in the station,
and the other parts of the system were completed.
A bank of one thousand lamps was placed in one
of the buildings ; and in the summer a whole month
was spent in making tests of the working of the
system, using this bank of lamps instead of sending
current out to customers' premises. Edison and his
assistants made the station their home during this
busy month. They even slept there on cots that he
had sent to the station for this purpose.

The system tested out satisfactorily, and finally,
on September 4, 1882, at three o'clock in the after-
noon, the station was started by sending out current
from one of the big dynamos through the conductors
laid in the streets, and electric light was supplied for
the first time to a number of customers in the
district.

The station was now started and everything went
well. New customers were added daily, and very
soon it became necessary to supply more current.
This called for the operation of two dynamos at one
time. As this involved new problems, Edison chose
a Sunday to try it, when business places would be
closed. We will let him tell the story. He says:
"My heart was in my mouth at first, but everything
worked all right. . . . Then we started another
engine and threw the dynamos in parallel. Of all

165

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

the circuses since Adam was born, we had the worst
then ! One engine would stop, and the other would
run up to about a thousand revolutions, and then
they would see-saw. The trouble was with the gov-
ernors. When the circus commenced the gang that
was standing around ran out precipitately, and I
guess some of them kept running for a block or two.
I grabbed the throttle of one engine, and E. H. John-
son, who was the only one present to keep his wits,
caught hold of the other, and we shut them off."

One of the gang that ran, but, in this case, only
to the end of the room, afterward said : "At the
time it was a terrifying experience, as I didn't know
what was going to happen. The engines and dyna-
mos made a horrible racket, from loud and deep
groans to a hideous shriek, and the place seemed to
be filled with sparks and flames of all colors. It was
as if the gates of the infernal regions had been sud-
denly opened.''

Edison attacked this problem in his strenuous
way. Although it was Sunday, he sent out and
gathered his men and opened the machine-works to
make new appliances to overcome this trouble.

Space will not permit of telling all the methods
he applied until the difficulty was entirely conquered.
It was only a short time, however, before he was
able to operate two or any number of dynamos all
together as one, in parallel, without the least trouble.

This early station grew and prospered, and con-
tinued in successful operation for more than seven
years, until January 2, 1890, when it was partially
destroyed by fire. This occurrence caused a short

166

EDISON CENTRAL STATION

interruption of service, but in a few days current
was again supplied to customers as before, and the
service has never since ceased.

Increasing demands for service soon afterward
led to the construction of other stations on Manhat-
tan Island, until at the present time the New York
Edison Company (the successor to the Edison Elec-
tric Illuminating Company of New York) is operat-
ing over forty stations and sub-stations. These
supply current for about 8oo,cxx) customers, wired
for 17,000,000 incandescent lamps and for about
1,300,000 horse-power in electric motors.

The early success of the first central station in
New York led to the formation of new companies
in other cities, and the installation of many similar
plants. The business has grown by leaps and bounds,
until at the present time there are many thousands of
central stations spread all over the United States,
furnishing electric light, heat, and power, chiefly by
use of the principles elaborated so many years ago
by Mr. Edison.

We ought to mention that this tremendous growth
has also been largely due to another invention made
by him in 1882, called the "three-wire system." Its
value consists in the fact that it allowed a further
saving of sixty-two and one-half per cent, of copper
required for conductors. This invention is in uni-
versal use all over the world.

It may be mentioned here that at the opening cere-
monies of the Electrical Exposition in New York,
on October 11, 191 1, the leading producers and con-
sumers of copper presented Mr. Edison with an

167

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

inscribed cubic foot of that metal in recognition of
the stimulus of his inventions to the industry. The
inscription shows that the yearly output of copper
was 377,644,000 pounds at the time of Edison's
first invention in 1868, and in October, 191 1, the
yearly output had increased to 1,910,608,000 pounds.

168

XVII

Edison's electric railway

IT IS quite likely that many of our young readers
have never seen a horse-car. This is not strange,
for in a little over twenty years the victorious trolley
has displaced the old-time street-cars drawn by one
or two horses. Indeed, a horse-car is quite a curi-
osity in these modern days, for such vehicles have
almost entirely disappeared from the streets.

The first horse railroad in the United States was
completed in 1827, and it was only seven years after-
ward that a small model of a circular electric rail-
road was made and exhibited by Thomas Daven-
port, of Brandon, Vermont. Other inventors also
worked on electric railways later on, but they did
not make much progress, because in their day there
were no dynamos, and they had to use primary bat-
teries to obtain current. This method of generating
current was far too cumbersome and expensive for
general use.

In 1879, after dynamos had become known, the
firm of Siemens exhibited at the Berlin Exhibition
a road about one-third of a mile in length, over
which an electric locomotive hauled three small cars
at a speed of about eight miles an hour.

This was just before Edison had developed the
efficient commercial dynamo with low-resistance

169

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

armature and high-resistance field, which made it
possible to generate and use electric power cheaply.
Thus we see that Edison was not the first to form
the broad idea of a electric railway, but his dynamo
and systems of distribution and regulation of current
first made the idea commercially practicable.

When Edison made his trip to Wyoming with
the astronomers in 1878 he noticed that the farmers
had to make long hauls of their grain to the rail-
roads or markets. He then conceived the idea of
building light electric railways to perform this
service.

As we have already noted, he started on his elec-
tric-light experiments, including the dynamo, when
he returned from the West. He had not forgotten
his scheme for an electric railway, however, for,
early in 1880, after the tremendous rush on the
invention of the incandescent lamp had begun to
subside, he commenced the construction of a stretch
of track at Menlo Park, and at the same time began
to build an electric locomotive to operate over it.

The locomotive was an ordinary flat dump-car
on a four-wheeled iron truck. Upon this w^as
mounted one of his dynamos, used as a motor. It
had a capacity of about twelve horse-power. Elec-
tric current was generated by two dynamos in the
machine-shop, and carried to the rails by under-
ground conductors.

The track was about a third of a mile in length,
the rails being of light weight and spiked to ties
laid on the ground. In this short line there were
some steep grades and short curves. The locomotive

170

EDISON'S ELECTRIC RAILWAY

pulled three cars ; one a flat freight-car ; one an open
awning-car, and one box-car, facetiously called the
*Tullman," with which Edison illustrated a system
of electromagnetic braking.

On May 13, 1880, this road went into operation.
All the laboratory "boys" made holiday and scram-
bled aboard for a trip. Things went well for a
w^hile, but presently a weakness developed and it be-
came necessary to return the locomotive to the shop
to make changes in the mechanism. And so it was
for a short time afterward. Imperfections of one
kind and another were disclosed as the road was
operated, but Edison was equal to the occasion and
overcame them, one by one. Before long he had
his locomotive running regularly, hauling the three
cars with freight and passengers back and forth over
the full length of the track. Incidentally, the writer
remembers enjoying a ride over the road one sum-
mer afternoon.

The details of the various improvements made
during these months are too many and too techni-
cal to be given here. It is a fact, however, that
at this time Edison was doing some heavy electric
railway engineering, each improvement representing
a step which advanced the art toward the perfection
it has reached in these modern days.

The newspapers and technical journals lost no
time in publishing accounts of this electric railroad,
and once again Menlo Park received great numbers
of visitors, including many railroad men, who came
to see and test this new method of locomotion.

Of course, in operating this early road there were
171

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

a few mishaps, fortunately none of them of a seri-
ous nature. In the correspondence of the late Gros-
venor P. Lowry, a friend and legal adviser of Mr.
Edison, is a letter dated June 5, 1880, giving an
account of one experience. The letter reads as
follows: "Goddard and I have spent a part of the
day at Menlo, and all is glorious. I have ridden at
forty miles an hour on Mr. Edison's electric railway
— and we ran off the track. I protested at the rate
of speed over the sharp curves, designed to show
the power of the engine, but Edison said they had
done it often. Finally, when the last trip was to be
taken, I said I did not like it, but would go along.
The train jumped the track on a short curve, throw-
ing Kruesi, who was driving the engine, with his
face down in the dirt, and another man in a comical
somersault through some underbrush. Edison was
off in a minute, jumping and laughing, and declaring
it a most beautiful accident. Kruesi got up, his face
bleeding, and a good deal shaken ; and I shall never
forget the expression of voice and face in which
he said, with some foreign accent: 'Oh yes! pair-
feckly safe.' Fortunately no other hurts were suf-
fered, and in a few minutes we had the train on the
track and running again."

This first electric railway was continued in opera-
tion right along through 1881. In the fall of that
year Edison was requested by the late Mr. Henry
Villard to build a longer road at Menlo Park,
equipped with more powerful locomotives, to dem-
onstrate the feasibility of putting electric railroads
in the Western wheat country.

172

EDISON'S ELECTRIC RAILWAY

Work was commenced at once, and early in 1882
the road and its equipment were finished. It was
three miles long, and had sidings, turn-tables, freight
platform and car-house. It was much more complete
and substantial than the first railroad. There were
two locomotives, one for freight and the other for
passenger service.

The passenger locomotive was very speedy and
hauled as many as ninety persons at a time. Many
thousands of passengers traveled over the road dur-
ing 1882. The freight locomotive was not so speedy,
but could pull heavy trains at a good speed. Taken
altogether, this early electric railway made a great
advance toward modern practice as its exists to-day.

There are many interesting stories of the railway
period at Menlo Park. One of them, as told by the
late Charles T. Hughes, who worked with Edison
on the experimental roads, is as follows: "Mr. Vil-
lard sent J. C. Henderson, one of his mechanical
engineers, to see the road when it was in opera-
tion, and we went down one day — Edison, Hen-
derson, and I — and went on the locomotive. Edison
ran it, and just after we started there was a
trestle sixty feet long and seven feet deep, and
Edison put on all the power. When we went over
it we must have been going forty miles an hour,
and I could see the perspiration come out on Hen-
derson. After we got over the trestle and started
on down the track Henderson said : 'When we go
back I will walk. If there is any more of that kind
of running I won't be in it myself.' "

The young reader, who is now living in an age

173

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

in which the electric railway is regarded as a matter
of course, will find it difficult to comprehend that
there should ever have been any doubt on the part
of engineering experts as to the practicability of
electric railroads. But in the days of which we are
writing such was the case, as the following remarks
of Mr. Edison will show : ''At one time Mr. Villard
got the idea that he would run the mountain division
of the Northern Pacific Railroad by electricity. He
asked me if it could be done. I said: 'Certainly; it
is too easy for me to undertake; let some one else
do it.' He said: 'I want you to tackle the problem,'
and he insisted on it. So I got up a scheme of a
third rail and shoe and erected it in my yard here
in Orange. When I got it all ready he had all his
division engineers come on to New York, and they
came over here. I showed them my plans, and the
unanimous decision of the engineers was that it was
absolutely and utterly impracticable. That system
is on the New York Central now, and was also used
on the New Haven road in its first work with
electricity."

Mr. Edison knew at the time that these engineers
were wrong. They were prejudiced and lacking in
foresight, and had no faith in electric railroading.
Indeed, these particular engineers were not by any
means the only persons who could see no future for
electric methods of transportation. Their doubts
were shared by capitalists and others, and it was
not until several years afterward that the business of
electrifying street railroads was commenced in real
earnest.

174

EDISON'S ELECTRIC RAILWAY

In the mean time, however, Edison's faith did not
waver, and he continued his work on electric rail-
ways, making innumerable experiments and taking
out a great many patents, including a far-sighted
one covering a sliding contact in a slot. This prin-
ciple and many of those covered by his earlier work
are in use to-day on the street railways in large
cities.

The early railroad at Menlo Park has gone to
ruin and decay, but the crude locomotive built by
Edison has become the property of the Pratt Insti-
tute, of Brooklyn, New York, to whose students it
is a constant example and incentive.

Down to the present moment Edison has kept up
an active interest in transportation problems. His
latest work has been in the line of operating street-
cars with his improved storage battery. During the
time that this book has been in course of preparation
he has given a great deal of time to this question.

Some years ago there were a number of street-cars
in various cities operated by storage batteries of a
class entirely different from the battery invented by
Edison. We refer to storage batteries containing
lead and sulphuric acid. These were found to be
so costly to operate and maintain that their use was
abandoned.

Mr. Edison's new nickel and iron storage battery
with alkaline solution has been found by practical
use to be entirely satisfactory for operating street-
cars, not only at a low cost, but also with ease of
operation and at a trifling expense for maintenance.

175

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

Of course there have been many problems, but he
has surmounted the principal difficulties, and there
are now quite a number of street-cars operated by
his storage battery in various cities. These cars
are earning profits and their number is steadily
increasing.

176

XVIII

GRINDING MOUNTAINS TO DUST

ON WALKING along the sea-shore the reader may
have noticed occasional streaks or patches of
bluish-black sand, somewhat like gunpowder in ap-
pearance. It is carried up from the bed of the sea
and deposited by the waves on the shore to a greater
or lesser extent on many beaches.

If a magnet be brought near to this "black sand"
the particles will be immediately attracted to it, just
as iron filings would be in such a case. As a matter
of fact, these particles of black sand are grains of
finely divided magnetic iron in a very pure state.

Now, if we should take a piece of magnetic iron
ore in the form of a rock and grind it to powder
the particles of iron could be separated from the
ground-up mass by drawing them out with a magnet,
just as they could be drawn out of a heap of sea-
shore sand. If all the grains of iron were thus
separated and put together, or concentrated, they
would be called concentrates.

During the last century a great many experiment-
ers besides Edison attempted to perfect various cheap
methods of magnetically separating iron ores, but
until he took up the work on a large scale no one
seems to have realized the real meaning of the tre-
mendous problems involved.

177

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

The beginning of this work on the part of Edison
was his invention in 1880 of a pecuHar form of
magnetic separator. It consisted of a suspended
V-shaped hopper with an adjustable sHt along the
pointed end. A long electromagnet was placed, edge-
wise, a little below the hopper, and a bin with a
dividing partition in the center was placed on the
floor below.

Crushed ore, or sand, was placed in the hopper.
If there was no magnetism this fine material would
flow down in a straight line past the magnet and
fill the bin on one side of the partition. If, how-
ever, the magnet were active the particles of iron
would be attracted out of the line of the falling mate-
rial, but their weight would carry them beyond the
magnet and they would fall to the other side of the
partition. Thus, the material would be separated,
the grains of iron going to one side and the grains
of rock or sand to the other side.

This separator, as afterward modified, was the
basis of a colossal enterprise conducted by Mr. Edi-
son, as we shall presently relate. But first let us
glance at an early experiment on the Atlantic sea-
shore in 1 88 1, as mentioned by him. He says:

"Some years ago I heard one day that down at
Quogue, Long Island, there were immense deposits
of black magnetic sand. This would be very valu-
able if the iron could be separated from the sand.
So I went down to Quogue with one of my assist-
ants and saw there for miles large beds of black
sand on the beach in layers from one to six inches
thick — hundreds of thousands of tons. My first

178

GRINDING MOUNTAINS TO DUST

thought was that it would be a very easy matter to
concentrate this, and I found I could sell the stuff at
a good price. I put up a small magnetic separating
plant, but just as I got it started a tremendous storm
came up, and every bit of that black sand went out
to sea. During the twenty-eight years that have in-
tervened it has never come back."

In the same year a similar separating plant was
put up and worked on the Rhode Island shore by
the writer under Mr. Edison's direction. More than
one thousand tons of concentrated iron ore of line
quality were separated from sea-shore sand and sold.
It was found, however, that it could not be suc-
cessfully used on account of being so finely divided.
Had this occurred a few years later, when Edison
invented a system of putting this fine ore into
briquettes, that part of the story might have been
different.

Magnetic separation of ores was allowed to rest
for many years after this, so far as Edison was
concerned. He was intensely busy on the electric
light, electric railway, and other similar problems
until 1888, and then undertook the perfecting and
manufacturing of his improved phonograph, and
other matters. Somewhere about 1890, however, he
again took up the subject of ore-separation.

For some years previous to that time the Eastern
iron-mills had been suffering because of the scarcity
of low-priced high-grade ores. If low-grade ores
could be crushed and the iron therein concentrated
and sold at a reasonable price the furnaces would
be benefited. Edison decided, after mature delibera-

179

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

tion, that if these low-grade ores were magnetically
separated on a colossal scale at a low cost the
furnace-men could be supplied with the much-
desired high quality of iron ore at a price which
would be practicable.

He appreciated the fact that it was a serious and
gigantic problem, but was fully satisfied that he
could solve it. He first planned a great magnetic
survey of the East, with the object of locating large
bodies of magnetic iron ore. This survey was
the greatest and most comprehensive of the kind
ever made. With a peculiarly sensitive magnetic
needle to indicate the presence of magnetic ore in
the earth, he sent out men who made a survey of
twenty-five miles across country, all the way from
lower Canada to North Carolina.

Edison says : "The amount of ore disclosed by
this survey was simply fabulous. How much so
may be judged from the fact that in the three thou-
sand acres immediately surrounding the mills that I
afterward established at Edison, New Jersey, there
were over two hundred million tons of low-grade
ore. I also secured sixteen thousand acres in
which the deposit was proportionately as large.
These few acres alone contained sufficient ore to
supply the whole United States iron trade, including
exports, for seventy years."

Given a mountain of rock containing only one-
fifth to one-fourth magnetic iron, the broad prob-
lem confronting Edison resolved itself into three
distinct parts — ^first, to tear down the mountain bod-
ily and grind it to powder; second, to extract from

1 80

GRINDING MOUNTAINS TO DUST

this powder the particles of iron mingled in its
mass ; and third, to accomplish these results at a cost
sufficiently low to give the product a commercial
value.

From the start Edison realized that in order to
carry out this program there would have to be auto-
matic and continuous treatment of the material, and
that he would have to make the fullest possible use
of natural forces, such as gravity and momentum.
The carrying out of these principles and ideas gave
rise to some of the most brilliant engineering work
that has ever been done by Edison. During this
period he also made many important inventions, of
which several will now be mentioned.

As he proposed to treat enormous masses of mate-
rial, one of the chief things to be done was to pro-
vide for breaking the rock and crushing it to powder
rapidly and cheaply. After some experimenting, he
found there was no machinery to be bought that
would do the work as it must be done. He was
therefore compelled to invent a series of machines
for the purpose.

The first of these was an invention quite char-
acteristic of Edison's daring and boldness. It em-
braced a gigantic piece of mechanism, called the
"Giant Rolls," which was designed to break up
pieces of rock that might be as large as an ordinary
upright piano, and weighing as much as eight tons.

A pair of iron cylinders five feet long and six
feet in diameter, covered with steel knobs, were set
fifteen inches apart in a massive frame. The rolls
weighed about seventy tons. By means of a steam

i8i

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

engine these rolls were revolved in opposite direc-
tions until they attained a peripheral speed of about
a mile a minute. Then the rocks were dumped into
a hopper which guided them between the rolls, and
in a few seconds, with a thunderous noise, they
were reduced to pieces about the size of a man's
head. The belts were released by means of slipping
friction clutches when the load was thrown on the
rolls, the breaking of the rocks being accomplished
by momentum and kinetic energy.

The broken rock then passed through similar rolls
of a lesser size, by means of which it was reduced
to much smaller pieces. These in their turn passed
through a series of other machines in which they
were crushed to fine powder. Here again Edison
made another remarkable invention, called the
"Three-High Rolls," for reducing the rock to fine
powder. The best crushers he had been able to buy
had an efficiency of only eighteen per cent, and a loss
by friction of eighty-two per cent. By his invention
he reversed these figures and obtained a working
efficiency of eighty- four per cent, and reduced the
loss to sixteen per cent.

The problems of drying and screening the broken
and crushed material were also solved most ingeni-
ously by Edison's inventive skill and engineering
ability, and always with the idea and purpose in
mind of accomplishing these results by availing him-
self to the utmost of one of the great forces of
Nature — gravity.

The great extent of the concentrating works may
be imagined when we state that two hundred and

182

EDISON AT THE OFFICE DOOR OF THE ORE-CONCEXTRATIXG PLANT AT
EDISON, NEW JERSEY, IN THE 'NINETIES

GRINDING MOUNTAINS TO DUST

fifty tons of material per hour could be treated.
Altogether, there were about four hundred and
eighty immense magnetic separators in the plant,
through which this crushed rock passed after going
through the numerous crushing, drying, and screen-
ing processes.

If it had been necessary to transfer this tre-
mendous quantity of material from place to place
by hand the cost would have been too great. Edison,
therefore, designed an original and ingenious system
of mechanical belt conveyors that would automati-
cally receive and discharge their loads at appointed
places in the works, covering about a mile in transit.
They went up and down, winding in and out, turn-
ing corners, delivering material from one bin to
another, making a number of loops in the drying-
oven, filling up bins, and passing on to the next
one when full. In fact, these conveyors in auto-
matic action seemed to play their part with human
intelligence.

We have been able to take only a passing glance
at the great results achieved by Edison in his nine
years' work on this remarkable plant — a work de-
serving of most serious study. The story would
be incomplete, however, if we did not mention his
labors on putting the fine ore in the form of solid
briquettes.

When the separated iron was first put on the
market it was found that it could not be used in
that form in the furnaces. Edison was therefore
obliged to devise some other means to make it avail-
able. After a long series of experiments he found

183

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

a way of putting it into the form of small, solid
briquettes. These answered the purpose exactly.

This called for a line of new machinery, which
he had to invent to carry out the plan. When this
was completed, the great rocks went in at one end
of the works and a stream of briquettes poured out
of the other end, being made by each briquetting
machine at the rate of sixty per minute.

Thus, with never-failing persistence, infinite pa-
tience, intense thought and hard work, Edison met
and conquered, one by one, the difficulties that had
confronted him. Furnace trials of his briquettes
proved that they were even better than had been
anticipated. He had received some large orders for
them and was shipping them regularly. Every-
thing was bright and promising, when there came
a fatal blow.

The discovery of rich Bessemer ore in the Mesaba
range of mountains in Minnesota a few years before
had been followed by the opening of the mines there
about this time. As this rich ore could be sold for
three dollars and fifty cents per ton, as against six
dollars and fifty cents per ton for Edison's bri-
quettes, his great enterprise must be abandoned at the
very moment of success.

It was a sad blow to Edison's hopes. He had
spent nine years of hard work and about two mil-
lions of his own money in the great work that had
thus been brought to nought through no fault of
his. The project had lain close to his heart and
ambition, indeed he had put aside almost all other
work and inventions for a while.

184

GRINDING MOUNTAINS TO DUST

For five of the nine years he had lived and worked
steadily at Edison (the name of the place where the
works were located), leaving there only on Saturday
night to spend Sunday at his home in Orange, and
returning to the plant by an early train on Monday
morning. Life at Edison was of the simple kind —
work, meals, and a few hours' sleep day by day,
but Mr. Edison often says he never felt better than
he did during those five years.

After careful investigations and calculations it
was decided to close the plant. Mr. W. S. Mallory,
his close associate during those years of the con-
centrating work, says : "The plant was heavily in
debt, and, as Mr. Edison and I rode on the train
to Orange, plans were discussed as to how to make
enough money to pay off the debt. Mr. Edison
stated most positively that no company with which
he had been personally actively connected had ever
failed to pay its debts, and he did not propose to
have the concentrating company any exception.

"We figured carefully over the probabilities of
financial returns from the phonograph works and
other enterprises, and, after discussing many plans,
it was finally decided that we would apply the knowl-
edge we had gained in the concentrating plant to
building a plant for manufacturing Portland cement,
and that Mr. Edison would devote his attention
to the developing of a storage battery which did not
use lead and sulphuric acid.

"He started in with the maximum amount of
enthusiasm and ambition, and in the course of about

i8s

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

three years we succeeded in paying off the indebted-
ness of the concentrating works.

"As to the state of Mr. Edison's mind when the
final decision was reached to close down, if he was
specially disappointed there was nothing in his man-
ner to indicate it, his every thought being for the
future."

In this attitude we find a true revelation of one
conspicuous trait in Mr. Edison. No one ever cried
less over spilled milk than he. He had spent a
fortune and had devoted nine years of his life to
the most intense thought and labor in the creation
and development of this vast enterprise. He had
made many remarkable inventions and had achieved
a very great success, only to see the splendid results
swept away in a moment. He did not sit down and
bewail his lot, but with true philosophy and greatness
of mind applied himself with characteristic energy
to new work through which he might be able to
open up a more promising future.

i86

XIX

EDISON MAKES PORTLAND CEMENT

LONG before Edison ever thought of going into
J the manufacture of cement he had very pro-
nounced opinions of its value for building purposes.
More than twenty-five years ago, during a discus-
sion on ancient buildings, he remarked : ''Wood will
rot, stone will chip and crumble, bricks disintegrate,
but a cement and iron structure is apparently inde-
structible. Look at some of the old Roman baths.
They are as solid as when they were built."

With such convictions, and the vast fund of prac-
tical knowledge and experience he had gained at
Edison in the crushing and handling of enormous
masses of finely divided material, it is not surprising
that he should have decided to engage in the manu-
facture of cement.

He was fully aware of the fact that he was pro-
posing to ''butt into" an old-established industry, in
which the principal manufacturers were concerns
which had been in business for a long time. He
knew there were great problems to be solved, both
in manufacturing and selling the cement. These dif-
ficulties, however, only made the proposition more
inviting to him.

Edison followed his usual course of reading up
all the literature on the subject that he could find,

i87

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

and seeking information from all quarters. After
thorough study he came to the conclusion that with
his improved methods of handling finely crushed
material, and with some new inventions and proc-
esses he had in mind, he could go into the cement
business and succeed in making a finer quality of
product. As we shall see later, he ''made good."

This study of the cement proposition took place
during the first few months of his experimenting
on a new storage battery. In the mean time Mr.
Mallory had been busy arranging for the formation
of a company with the necessary money to com-
mence and carry on the business. One day he went
to the laboratory and told Mr. Edison that every-
thing was ready and that it was now time to engage
engineers to lay out the works.

To this Edison replied that he intended to do that
himself, and invited Mr. Mallory to go with him
to one of the draughting-rooms up-stairs. Here
Edison placed a sheet of paper on a draughting-
table and immediately began to draw out a plan of
the proposed works. He continued all day and away
into the evening, when he finished; thus completing
within twenty- four hours the full lay-out of the
entire plant as it was subsequently installed. If the
plant were to be rebuilt to-day no vital change would
be necessary.

It will be granted that this was a remarkable en-
gineering feat, for Edison was then a new-comer in
the cement business. But in that one day's planning
everything was considered and provided for, includ-

i88

PORTLAND CEMENT

ing crushing, mixing, weighing, grinding, drying
screening, sizing, burning, packing, storing, and
other processes.

From one end to the other the cement plant is
about half a mile long, and through the various
buildings there passes, automatically, each day a vast
quantity of material under treatment. In practice
this results in the production of more than two and
a quarter million pounds of finished cement every
twenty- four hours.

Not only was all this provided for in that one
day's designing, but also smaller details, such, for
instance, as the carrying of all steam, water and air
pipes and electrical conductors in a large subway
extending from one end of the plant to the other;
also a system by which the ten thousand bearings in
the plant are oiled automatically, requiring the serv-
ices of only two men for the entire work.

Following this general outline plan of the whole
plant by Edison himself there came the preparation
of the detail plans by his engineers. As the manu-
facture of cement also involves the breaking and
grinding of rocks, the scheme, of course, included
using the giant rolls and other crushing, drying, and
screening machinery invented by him for the iron-
concentrating work, as mentioned in our last chapter.

No magnetic separator is necessary in cement-
making, but there were other processes to provide
for that did not occur in concentrating iron ore. One
of them relates to burning the material, which is
one of the most important processes in manufactur-
ing cement.

189

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

Perhaps it may be well to state for the informa-
tion of the reader that in cement-making, generally-
speaking, cement-rock and limestone in the rough
are mixed together and ground to a fine powder.
This powder is ''burned'' in a kiln and comes out in
the form of balls, called ''clinker." This again is
crushed to a fine powder, which is the cement of
commerce.

It will be seen, therefore, that the quantity of
finished cement produced depends largely upon the
capacity of the kilns. When Edison first thought
of going into cement-making he expected to use the
old style of kilns, which were about sixty feet long
and six feet in diameter, and had a capacity of turn-
ing out about two hundred barrels of clinker every
twenty-four hours. He is never satisfied, however,
to take the experience of others as final, and thought
he could improve on what had been done before.

He discussed the project with Mr. Mallory, who
says : "After having gone over this matter several
times, Mr. Edison said, 'I believe I can make a kiln
which will give an output of one thousand barrels
in twenty-four hours.' Although I had then been
closely associated with him for ten years and w^as
accustomed to see him accomplish great things, I
could not help feeling the improbability of his being
able to jump into an old-established industry — as a
novice — and start by improving the 'heart' of the
production so as to increase its capacity four hundred
per cent. But Mr. Edison went to work immediately
and very soon completed the design of a new type of
kiln which was to be one hundred and fifty feet long

190

PORTLAND CEMENT

and nine feet in diameter, made up in ten-foot sec-
tions of cast iron bolted together and arranged to be
revolved on fifteen bearings. He had a wooden
model made, and studied it very carefully through a
series of experiments. These resulted so satisfac-
torily that this form was finally decided upon, and
ultimately installed as part of the plant.

"Well, for a year or so the kiln problem was a
nightmare to me. We could only obtain four hun-
dred barrels at first, but gradually crept up through
a series of heart-breaking trials until we got over
eleven hundred barrels a day. Mr. Edison never
lost his confidence throughout the trials, but on re-
ceiving a disappointing report would order us to
try it again."

Although the older cement manufacturers pre-
dicted utter failure, they have since recognized the
success of Edison's long kiln, and it is now being
used quite generally in the trade.

Another invention of minor nature but worthy
of note relates to the weighing of the proportions
of cement-rock and limestone. In most cases the
measurement is usually by barrow loads, but Edison
determined that it must be done accurately to the
pound, and devised a means of doing it automati-
cally, for, as he remarked, 'The man at the scales
might get to thinking of the other fellow's best girl,
so fifty or a hundred pounds of rock, more or less,
wouldn't make much difference to him."

With Edison's device the scales are set at certain
weights and the materials are fed from hoppers.
The moment the scale-beam tips an electrical con-

191

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

nection automatically stops the feed and no more
can be put on the scale until the load is withdrawn.

Another and important new feature introduced by
Edison was in raising the standard of fine grinding
of cement ten points above the regular standard of
seventy-five per cent, through a two-hundred-mesh
screen. By reason of the great improvement he had
made in grinding machinery he could grind cement
so that eighty-five per cent, passed through a two-
hundred-mesh screen. As cement is valuable in pro-
portion to its fineness, it will be seen that he has thus
made an advance of great importance to the trade.

We cannot enter into all the details of the nu-
merous inventions and improvements that Edison
has introduced into his cement plant during the last
eight or nine years. It is sufficient to say that by
his persistent and energetic labors during that period
he has raised his plant from the position of a new-
comer to the rank of the fifth largest producer of
cement in this country.

A remarkable instance of the power of Edison's
memory may be related here. Some years ago, when
the cement plant was nearly finished and getting
ready to start, he went up to look it over and see
what needed to be done.

On the arrival of the train at ten-forty in the
morning he went to the mill, and, starting at one
end, went through the plant to the other end, ex-
amining every detail. He made no notes or memo-
randa, but the examination required all day.

In the afternoon, at five-thirty, he took a train
for home, and on arriving there a few hours later

192

PORTLAND CEMENT

got out some note-books and began to write from
memory the things needing change or attention.
He continued on this work all night and right along
until the next afternoon, when he completed a list of
nearly six hundred items. This memory "stunt"
was the more remarkable because many of the items
included all the figures of new dimensions he had
decided upon for some of the machinery in the plant.

Each item was numbered consecutively, and the
list copied and sent up to the superintendent, who
was instructed to make the changes and report by
number as they were done. These changes were
made and their value was proven by later experience.

Edison's achievements have made a deep impres-
sion on the cement industry, but it is likely that it
will become still deeper when his 'Toured Cement
House" is exploited.

A few years ago he conceived the idea of pouring
a complete concrete house in a few hours. He made
a long series of experiments for producing a free-
flowing combination of the necessary materials, and
at length found one that satisfied him that his idea
was feasible, although experts said it could not be
done.

His plan is to provide two sets of iron molds, one
inside the other, with an open space between. These
molds are made in small pieces and set up by being
bolted together. When erected, the concrete mix-
ture is poured in from the top in a continuous stream
until the space between the molds is filled.

The pouring will be done in about six hours, after
which the molds will be left in position about four

193

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

days in order that the concrete may harden. When
the molds are removed there will remain standing
an entire house, complete from cellar to roof, with
walls, floors, stairways, bath and laundry tubs, all in
one solid piece. These houses, when built in quan-
tity, can be produced at a very moderate cost.

Mr. Edison intends this house for the working-
man, and in its design has insisted on its being orna-
mental as well as substantial. As he expressed it :
*'We will give the workingman and his family orna-
mentation in their house. They deserve it, and be-
sides, it costs no more after the pattern is made to
give decorative effects than it would to make every-
thing plain."

194

XX

MOTION-PICTURES

THROUGH his invention and introduction of the
phonograph and of his apparatus for taking
and exhibiting motion-pictures Edison has probably-
done more to interest and amuse the world than any
other living man. These two forms of amusement
have more audiences in a week than all the theaters
in America in a year.

It is a curious fact that while instantaneous pho-
tography is necessary to produce motion pictures,
the suggestion of producing them was made many
years before the instantaneous photograph became
possible.

One of the earliest efforts in this direction was
made before Edison was born, and shown by a toy
called the Zoetrope, or "Wheel of Life." A num-
ber of figures showing fractional parts of the mo-
tion of an object — such, for instance, as a boy
skating — were boldly drawn in silhouette on a strip
of paper. This paper was put inside an open cylin-
der having small openings around its circumference.
The cylinder was mounted on a pivot, and, when
revolved, the figures on the paper seemed to be in
motion when viewed through the openings.

The success of this and similar toys, as well as
of modern motion-pictures, depends upon a phenom-

195

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

enon known as the "persistence of vision." This
means that if an object be presented to the vision
for a moment and then withdrawn, the image of
that object will remain impressed on the retina of
the eye for a period of one-tenth to one-seventh of
a second.

If, for instance, a bright light be moved rapidly
up and down in front of the eye in a dark room
it appears not as a single light, but as a line of fire,
because there is not time for the eye to lose the
image of the light between the rapid phases of its
motion. For the same reason, if a number of pic-
tures exactly alike were rapidly presented to the eye
in succession it would seem as if a single picture
were being viewed.

Thus, if a number of photographs, say at the rate
of fifteen per second, be taken of a moving object,
each successive photograph will show a fraction of
the movements. Now if these photographs be
thrown on a screen in the same order and at the
same rate at which they were taken the movements
of the object would apparently again take place, be-
cause the eye does not have time to lose the image
of one fractional movement before the next follows.

One of the earliest suggestions of reproducing ani-
mate motion was made by a Frenchman named
Ducos about 1864. He was followed by others, but
they were all handicapped by the fact that dry-plates
and sensitized film were entirely unknown, and the
wet plates then used were entirely out of the ques-
tion for the development of a practical commercial
scheme.

S96

MOTION-PICTURES

The first serious attempt to secure photographs of
objects in motion was made in 1878 by Edward
Muybridge. At this time very rapid wet-plates were
known. By arranging a fine of cameras along a
track and causing a horse in trotting past them to
strike wires or strings attached to the shutters, the
plates were exposed and a series of clear instanta-
neous photographs of the horse in motion was
obtained.

Positive prints were made which were mounted
in a modified form of Zoetrope and projected upon
a screen. The horse in motion was thus reproduced,
but, differing from the motion-pictures of to-day, al-
w^ays remained in the center of the screen in violent
movement and making no progress.

Early in the 'eighties dry-plates were introduced,
and other experimenters took up the work, but they
were handicapped by the fact that plates were heavy
and only a limited number could be used. This
difficulty may be easily understood when it is realized
that a modern motion-picture reel lasting fifteen min-
utes comprises about sixteen thousand separate and
distinct photographs. The impossibility of manipu-
lating this large number of glass plates to show one
motion-picture play will be seen at once.

This was the condition of the art when Edison
entered upon the work. He himself says, *'In the
year 1887 the idea occurred to me that it was possi-
ble to devise an instrument which should do for the
eye what the phonograph does for the ear, and
that by a combination of the two all motion and

197

THE BOYS^ LIFE OF EDISON

sound could be recorded and reproduced simultane-
ously/'

Two very serious difficulties lay in the way, how-
ever— first, a sensitive surface of such form and
weight as could be successively brought into position
and exposed at a very high rate; and, secondly, the
making of a camera capable of so taking the pic-
tures. Edison proved equal to the occasion, and,
after an immense amount of work and experiment,
continuing over a long period of time, succeeded in
producing apparatus that made modern motion-
pictures possible.

In his earliest experiments a cylinder about the
size of a phonograph record was used. It was coated
with a highly sensitized surface, and microscopic
photographs, arranged spirally, were taken upon it.
Positive prints were made in the same way, and
viewed through a magnifying-glass. Various forms
of this apparatus were made, but all were open to
serious objections, the chief trouble being with the
photographic emulsion.

During this experimental period the kodak film
was being developed by the Eastman Kodak Com-
pany, under the direction of Mr. George Eastman.
Edison recognized that in this product there lay the
solution of that part of the problem. At first the
film was not just what he required, but the East-
man Company after a time developed and produced
the highly sensitized surface that Edison sought.

It then remained to devise a camera by means of
which from twenty to forty pictures per second could
be taken. Every user of a film camera can ap-

198

MOTION-PICTURES

preciate the difficulty of the problem. A long roll
of film must pass steadily behind the lens. At every
inch it must be stopped, the shutter opened for the
exposure, and then closed again. The film must be
advanced say an inch, and these operations repeated
twenty to forty times a second throughout, perhaps,
a thousand feet of film.

Who but an Edison would assume that such a
device could be made, and with such exactness that
each picture should coincide with the others ? After
much experiment, however, he finally accomplished
it, and in the sum.mer of 1889 the first modern
motion-picture camera was made. From that day
to this the Edison camera has been the accepted
standard for securing pictures of objects in motion.

The earliest form of exhibiting apparatus was
known as the kinetoscope. It was a machine in
which a positive print from the negative roll of film
obtained in the camera was exhibited directly to the
eyes through a peep-hole. About 1895 the pictures
were first shown through a modified form of magic
lantern, and have so continued to this day. The
industry has grown very rapidly, and for a long
time the principal American manufacturers of mo-
tion-pictures paid a royalty to Edison under his basic
patents.

The pictures made in the earliest days of the art
were simple and amusing, such as Fred Ott's sneeze,
Carmencita dancing, Italians and their performing
bears, fencing, trapeze stunts, horsemanship, black-
smithing, and so on. No attempt was made to por-
tray a story or play. The ''boys" at the laboratory

199

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

laugh when they tell of a local bruiser who agreed
to box a few rounds with "Ji"^" Corbett in front of
the camera. When this local * 'sparring partner"
came to face Corbett he was so paralyzed with terror
he could hardly move.

These early pictures were made in the yard of
Edison's laboratory at Orange, in a studio called
the "Black Maria." It was made of wood, painted
black inside and out, and could be swung around to
face the sunlight, which was admitted by a mov-
able part of the roof.

This is all very different in these modern days.
The studios in which interior motion-pictures are
made are expensive and pretentious affairs. An im-
mense building of glass, with all the properties and
stage settings of a regular theater, are required. Of
course many of the plays are produced out of doors,
in portions of the country suited to the story.

All the companies producing motion-pictures em-
ploy regular stock companies of actors and actresses,
selected especially for their skill in pantomime, al-
though, as may be suspected, in the actual taking of
the pictures they are required to carry on an ani-
mated dialogue as if performing on the real stage.
This adds to the smoothness and perfection of the
performance.

Motion-picture plays are produced under the direc-
tion of skilled stage-managers who must be specially
trained for this particular business. Their work is
far from being easy, for an act in a picture-play
must be exact and free from mistakes, and must
take place in a very short time. For instance, an

200

MOTION-PICTURES

act in such a play may take less than five minutes to
perform, but it must be carefully rehearsed for sev-
eral weeks beforehand.

There is plenty of scope for patience and inge-
nuity in taking motion-picture plays. If trained chil-
dren or animals are required they must be found
or trained; and all the resources of trick and stop
photography are called upon from time to time as
the occasion requires.

Edison has always held to his idea of a combina-
tion of the phonograph and motion-picture. Some
time ago he said, "I believe that in coming years,
by my own work and that of Dickson, Muybridge,
Marey, and others who will doubtless enter the field,
grand opera can be given at the Metropolitan Opera
House in New York without any material change
from the original, and with artists and musicians
long since dead."

This prediction has been partly fulfilled, for Edi-
son's successful talking motion-pictures marked the
beginning of the ''talkies" which are flourishing
to-day.

20I

XXI

EDISON INVENTS A NEW STORAGE BATTERY

MANY an invention has been made as the result
of some happy thought or inspiration, but
most inventions are made by men working along
certain lines, who set out to accomplish a desired
result. It is rarely, however, that man starts out
deliberately, as Edison did, to invent an entirely
new type of such an intricate device as a storage
battery, with only a vague starting point.

Previous to Edison's work the only type of stor-
age battery known was the one in which lead plates
and sulphuric acid were employed. He had always
realized the value of a storage battery as such, but
never believed that the lead-acid type could fulfil all
expectations because of its weight and incurable
defects.

About the time that he closed the magnetic iron
ore concentrating plant (in the beginning of the
present century) Edison remarked to Mr. R. H.
Beach, then of the General Electric Company:
''Beach, I don't think nature would be so unkind
as to withhold the secret of a good storage battery if
a real earnest hunt for it is made. Fm going to
hunt." And before starting he determined to avoid
lead and sulphuric acid.

Edison is frequently asked what he considers to

202

A NEW STORAGE BATTERY

be the secret of achievement. He always replies,
*'Hard work, based on hard thinking." He has
consistently lived up to this prescription to the
utmost.

Of all his inventions it is doubtful whether any
one of them has called forth more original thought,
work, perseverance, ingenuity, and monumental pa-
tience than the one we are now dealing with. One
of his associates who has been through the many
years of the storage-battery drudgery with him said :
''If Edison's experiments, investigations, and work
en this storage battery were all that he had ever
done, I should say that he was not only a notable
inventor, but also a great man. It is almost impossi-
ble to appreciate the enormous difficulties that have
been overcome."

From a beginning which was made practically in
the dark, it was not until he had completed more
than ten thousand experiments that he obtained any
positive results whatever. Month after month of
constant work by day and night had not broken
down Edison's faith in success, and the failure of
an experiment simply meant that he had found some-
thing else that would not do, thus bringing him
nearer the possible goal.

After this immense amount of preliminary work
he had obtained promising results in a series of re-
actions between nickel and iron, and was then all
afire to push ahead. He therefore estabHshed a
chemical plant at Silver Lake, New Jersey, and,
gathering around him a corps of mechanics, chem-
ists, machinists, and experimenters, settled down to

203

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

one of his characteristic struggles for supremacy.
To some extent it was a revival of the old Menlo
Park days and nights.

The group that took part in these early years of
Edison's arduous labors included his old-time assist-
ant, Fred Ott, together with his chemist, J. W. Ayls-
worth, as well as E. J. Ross, Jr. ; W. E. Holland,
and Ralph Arbogast, and a little later W. G. Bee,
all of whom grew up with the battery and devoted
their energies to its commercial development.

One of these workers, relating the strenuous ex-
periences of these few years, says : **It was hard
work and long hours, but still there were some things
that made life pleasant. One of them was the sup-
per-hour we enjoyed when we worked nights. Mr.
Edison would have supper sent in about midnight,
and we all sat down together, including himself.
Work was forgotten for the time, and all hands
were ready for fun. I have very pleasant recollec-
tions of Mr. Edison at these times. He would al-
ways relax and help to make a good time, and on
some occasions I have seen him fairly overflow with
animal spirits, just like a boy let out of school.
He was very fond of telling and hearing stories, and
always appreciated a joke. After the supper-hour
was over, however, he again became the serious,
energetic inventor, deeply immersed in the work in
hand."

Another interesting and amusing reminiscence of
this period of activity has been told by another of the
family of experimenters : ''Sometimes when Mr.
Edison had been working long hours he would want

204

A NEW STORAGE BATTERY

to have a short sleep. It was one of the funniest
things I ever witnessed to see him crawl into an
ordinary roll-top desk and curl up and take a nap.
If there was a sight that was still more funny, it
was to see him turn over on his other side, all the
time remaining in the desk. He would use several
volumes of Watts' Dictionary of Chemistry for a
pillow, and we fellows used to say that he absorbed
the contents during his sleep, judging from the flow
of new ideas he had on waking."

Such incidents as these serve merely to illustrate
the lighter moments that relieved the severe and
arduous labors of the strenuous five years of the
early storage-battery work of Edison and his as-
sociates. Difficulties there were a-plenty, but these
are what Edison usually thrives on. As another co-
worker of this period says : "Edison seemed pleased
when he used to run up against a serious difficulty.
It would seem to stiffen his backbone and make him
more prolific of new ideas. For a time I thought
I was foolish to imagine such a thing, but I could
never get away from the impression that he really
appeared happy when he ran up against a serious
snag."

It would be out of the question in a book of this
kind to follow Edison's trail in detail through the
innumerable twists and turns of his experimentation
on the storage battery, for they would fill a big
volume. The reader may imagine how extensive
they were from the reply of one of his laboratory
assistants, who, when asked how many experiments
were made on the storage battery since the year

205

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

1900, replied : "Goodness only knows ! We used to
number our experiments consecutively from one to
ten thousand, and when we got up to ten thousand
we turned back to one and ran up to ten thousand
again, and so on. We ran through several series —
I don't know how many, and have lost track of them
now, but it was not far from fifty thousand."

The mechanical problems in devising this battery
were numerous and intricate, but the greatest dif-
ficulty that Edison had to overcome was the proper
preparation of nickel hydrate for the positive and
iron oxide for the negative plate. He found that
comparatively little was known by manufacturing
chemists about these compounds. Hence it became
necessary for him to establish his own chemical
works and put them in charge of men specially
trained by himself.

After an intense struggle with these problems,
lasting over several years, the storage battery was
at length completed and put on the market. The
public was ready for it and there was a rapid sale.

Continuous tests of the battery were carried on
at the laboratory, as well as practical and heavy tests
in automobiles, which were kept running constantly
over all kinds of roads under Edison's directions.
After these tests had been going on for some time
the results showed that occasionally a cell here and
there would fall short in capacity.

This did not suit Edison. He was determined
to make his storage battery a complete success, and
after careful thought decided to shut down until he
had overcome the trouble. The customers were sat-

206

A NEW STORAGE BATTERY

isfied and wanted to buy more batteries, but he was
not satisfied and would sell no more until he had
made the battery perfect.

He therefore shut down the factory and went to
experimenting once more. The old strenuous
struggle set in and continued nearly three years be-
fore he was satisfied beyond doubt that the battery
was right. In the early summer of 1909 Edison
once more started to manufacture and sell the bat-
teries, and has since that time continued to supply
them as quickly as they are made. At the present
writing the factory is running day and night in at-
tempting to keep up with orders.

One of the principal troubles of the earlier cells
was a lack of conductivity between the nickel hy-
drate and the metal tube in which it was contained.
Edison had used graphite to obtain this conductiv-
ity, but this material proved to be uncertain in some
cases. After a long course of study and experimiCnt
he solved this problem in a satisfactory manner by
using flakes of pure nickel, which he obtained by a
most fascinating and ingenious process.

A metallic cylinder is electroplated with alternate
layers of copper and nickel, one hundred of each.
The combined sheet, which is only as thick as a
visiting-card, is stripped ofif the cylinder and cut into
tiny squares of about one-sixteenth of an inch each.
These squares are put into a bath which dissolves
out the copper. This releases the layers of nickel,
so that each of these squares becomes one hundred
tiny sheets, or flakes, of pure metallic nickel, so thin
and light that when they are dried they will float in

207

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

the air. These flakes are automatically pressed into
the positive tubes with the nickel hydrate in an
ingenious machine which had to be specially invented
for the purpose.

Not only was this machine specially invented, but
it was necessary to invent and design practically
all the other machinery that it was necessary to use
in manufacturing the battery. Thus, we see that
in this, as in many other of Edison's inventions, it
is not only the thing itself that has been invented,
but also the special machinery and tools to make it.

The principal use that Edison has had in mind for
his storage battery is the transportation of freight
and passengers by truck, automobile, and street-car.
Although at the time of writing this book the im-
proved battery has been on the market a little over
two years, great strides have been made in carrying
his ideas into effect.

The number of trucks and automobiles using Edi-
son's storage battery already run into the thousands,
with more orders than can be immediately filled.

208

XXII
Edison's miscellaneous inventions

THUS far the history of Edison's career has fallen
naturally into a series of chapters each aiming
to describe a group of inventions in the development
of some art. This plan has been helpful to the
writer and probably useful to the reader.

It happens, however, that the process has left a
vast mass of discovery and invention untouched,
and it is now proposed to make brief mention of a
few of the hundreds of things that have occupied
Edison's attention from time to time.

Beginning with telegraphy, we find that Edison
did some work on wireless transmission. He says :
"I perfected a system of train telegraphy between
stations and trains in motion, whereby messages
could be sent from the moving train to the central
office ; and this was the forerunner of wireless teleg-
raphy. This system was used for a number of
years on the Lehigh Valley Railroad on their con-
struction trains. The electric wave passed from a
piece of metal on top of the car across the air to
the telegraph wires, and then proceeded to the des-
patcher's office. In my first experiments with this
system I tried it on the Staten Island Railroad and
employed an operator named King to do the ex-
perimenting. He reported results every day, and

209

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

received instructions by mail; but for some reason
he could send messages all right when the train went
in one direction, but could not make it go in the
contrary direction. I made suggestions of every
kind to get around this phenomenon. Finally I tele-
graphed King to find out if he had any suggestions
himself, and I received a reply that the only way he
could propose to get around the difficulty was to put
the island on a pivot so it could be turned around.
I found the trouble finally, and the practical intro-
duction on the Lehigh Valley road was the result.
The system was sold to a very wealthy man, and he
would never sell any rights or answer letters. He
became a spiritualist subsequently, which probably
explains it."

The earlier experiments with wireless telegraphy
were made at Menlo Park during the first days of
the electric light, and it was not until 1886 that
Edison had time to spare to put the system into
actual use. At that time Ezra T. Gilliland and
Lucius J. Phelps, who had experimented on the
same lines, became associated with him in the work.

Although the space between the train and the pole
line was not more than fifty feet, Edison had suc-
ceeded at Menlo Park in transmitting messages
through the air at a distance of five hundred and
eighty feet. Speaking of this and of his other ex-
periments with induction telegraphy by means of
kites, he said, recently : "We only transmitted about
two and one-half miles through the kites. What has
always puzzled me since is that I did not think of
using the results of my experiments on 'ether ic force'

210

MISCELLANEOUS INVENTIONS

that I made in 1875. I hs-ve never been able to
understand how I came to overlook them. If I had
made use of my own work I should have had long-
distance wireless telegraphy."

These experiments of 1875, as recorded in Edi-
son's famous note-books, show that in that year he
detected and studied some then unknown and curi-
ous phenomena which made him think he was on the
trail of a new force. His representative, Mr. Batch-
elor, showed these experiments with Edison's ap-
paratus, including the "dark box," at the Paris
Exposition in 1881. Without knowing it, for he
was far in advance of the time, Edison had really
entered upon the path of long-distance wireless teleg-
raphy, as was proven later when the magnificent
work of Hertz was published.

When Roentgen made the discovery of the X-ray
in 1895 Edison took up experimentation with it on
a large scale. He made the first fluoroscope, using
tungstate of calcium for the screen. In order to find
other fluorescent substances he set four men to work
and thus collected upward of eight thousand differ-
ent crystals of various chemical combinations, of
which about eighteen hundred would fluoresce to
the X-ray. He also invented a new lamp for giving
light by means of these fluorescent crystals fused
to the inside of the glass. Some of these lamps
were made and used for a time, but he gave up the
idea when the dangerous nature of the X-ray became
known.

It would be possible to go on and describe in
brief detail many more of the hundreds of Edison's

211

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

miscellaneous inventions, but the limits of our space
will not permit more than the mere mention of a few,
simply to illustrate the wide range of his ideas and
work. For instance:

A dry process of separating placer gold; the rapid
disposal of heavy snows in cities.

Experiments on flying machines with an engine
operated by explosions of guncotton.

The joint invention, with M. W. Scott Sims, of
a dirigible submarine torpedo operated by elec-
tricity.

Pyromagnetic generators for generating electricity
directly from the combustion of coal.

Pyromagnetic motors operated by alternate heat-
ing and cooling.

A magnetic bridge for testing the magnetic quali-
ties of iron.

A ''dead-beat" galvanometer without coils or mag-
netic needle.

The odoroscope, for measuring odors; preserv-
ing fruit in vacuo; making plate glass; drawing
wire

Metallurgical processes for treatment of nickel,
gold, and copper ores.

From first to last Edison has filed in the United
States Patent Office more than fourteen hundred
applications for patents. Besides, he filed some one
hundred and twenty caveats, embracing not less
than fifteen hundred additional inventions. The
caveat has now been abolished in patent-office prac-
tice, but such a document could formerly be filed by
an inventor to obtain a partial protection for a year

212

MISCELLANEOUS INVENTIONS

while completing his invention. As an example of
Edison's fertility and the endless variety of subjects
engaging his attention the following list of matters
covered by one of his caveats is given. All his
caveats are not quite so full of ''plums," but this
is certainly a wonder :

Forty-one distinct inventions relating to the
phonograph, covering various forms of recorders,
arrangement of parts, making of records, shaving
tool, adjustments, etc.

Eight forms of electric lamps using infusible
earthy oxides and brought to high incandescence
in vacuo by high potential current of several thou-
sand volts ; same character as impingement of X-rays
on object in bulb.

A loud-speaking telephone with quartz cylinder
and beam of ultra-violet light.

Four forms of arc-light with special carbons.

A thermostatic motor.

A device for sealing together the inside part and
bulb of an incandescent lamp mechanically.

Regulators for dynamos and motors.

Three devices for utilizing vibrations beyond the
ultra-violet.

A great variety of methods for coating incan-
descent lamp filaments with silicon, titanium, chro-
mium, osmium, boron, etc.

Several methods of making porous filaments.

Several methods of making squirted filaments of
a variety of materials, of which about thirty are
specified.

213

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

Seventeen different methods and devices for sepa-
rating magnetic ores.

A continuously operative primary battery.

A musical instrument operating one of Helm-
holtz's artificial larynxes.

A siren worked by explosion of small quantities
of oxygen and hydrogen mixed.

Three other sirens made to give vocal sounds or
articulate speech.

A device for projecting sound-waves to a dis-
tance without spreading, and in a straight line, on
the principle of smoke-rings.

A device for continuously indicating on a gal-
vanometer the depths of the ocean.

A method of preventing in a great measure fric-
tion of water against the hull of a ship and inciden-
tally preventing fouling by barnacles.

A telephone receiver whereby the vibrations of
the diaphragm are considerably amplified.

Two methods of "space" telegraphy at sea.

An improved and extended string telephone.

Devices and method of talking through water for
a considerable distance.

An audiphone for deaf people.

Sound-bridge for measuring resistance of tubes
and other materials for conveying sound.

A method of testing a magnet to ascertain the
existence of flaws in the iron or steel composing the
same.

Method of distilling liquids by incandescent con-
ductor immersed in the liquid.

Method of obtaining electricity direct from coal.
214

MISCELLANEOUS INVENTIONS

An engine operated by steam produced by the
hydration and dehydration of metallic salts.

Device and method of telegraphing photograph-
ically.

Carbon crucible kept brilliantly incandescent by
current in vacuo for obtaining reaction with refrac-
tory metals.

Device for examining combinations of odors and
their changes by rotation at different speeds.

It must be borne in mind that the above and hun-
dreds of others are not merely ideas put in writing,
but represent actual inventions upon which Edison
worked and experimented. In many cases the ex-
periments ran into the thousands, requiring months
for their performance.

To describe Edison's mere ideas and suggestions
for future work would of itself fill a volume. These
are written in his own handwriting in a number of
large record-books which he has shown to the writer.
Judging from a hasty inspection, there is enough
material in these books to occupy the lifetime of
several persons.

The immense range of Edison's mind and activi-
ties cannot well be described in cold print, but can
only be adequately comprehended by those who have
been closely associated with him for a length of
time, and who have had opportunity of studying
his voluminous records.

215

XXIII
Edison's method in inventing

IF ONE were allowed only two words with which
to describe Edison it is doubtful whether a close
examination of the entire dictionary would disclose
any others more suitable than ''experimenter-inven-
tor." These would express the overruling charac-
teristics of his eventful career.

His life as child, boy, and man has revealed the
bom investigator with original reasoning powers,
unlimited imagination, and daring method. It is
not surprising, therefore, that a man of this kind
should exhibit a ceaseless, absorbing desire for
knowledge, willing to spend his last cent in experi-
mentation to satisfy the cravings of an inquiring
mind.

There is nothing of the slap-dash style in Edison's
experiments. While he "tries everything," it is not
merely the mixing of a little of this, some of that,
and a few drops of the other, in the hope that some-
thing will come of it. On the contrary, his instruc-
tions are always clear-cut and direct, and must be
followed out systematically, exactly, and minutely,
no matter where they lead nor how long the experi-
ment may take.

Unthinking persons have had a notion that some
of Edison's successes have been due to mere dumb

216

METHOD IN INVENTING

fool luck — to fortunate "happenings/' Nothing
could be farther from the truth, for, on the con-
trary, it is owing almost entirely to his comprehen-
sive knowledge, the breadth of his conception, the
daring originality of his methods, and minuteness
and extent of experiment, combined with patient,
unceasing perseverance, that new arts have been
created and additions made to others already in
existence.

One of the first things Edison does in beginning
a new line of investigation is to master the literature
of the subject. He wants to know what has been
done before. Not that he considers this as final, for
he often obtains vastly different results by repeating
in his own way the experiments of others.

"Edison can travel along a well-used road and still
find virgin soil," remarked one of his experimenters
recently, who had been trying to make a certain com-
pound, but with poor success. Edison tried it in the
same way, but made a change in one of the opera-
tions and succeeded.

Another of the experimental staff says : "Edison
is never hindered by theory, but resorts to actual
experiment for proof. For instance, when he con-
ceived the idea of pouring a complete concrete house
it was universally held that it would be impossible
because the pieces of stone in the mixture would not
rise to the level of the pouring-point, but would
gravitate to a lower plane in the soft cement. This,
however, did not hinder him from making a series
of experiments which resulted in an invention that
proved conclusively the contrary."

217

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

Having conceived some new idea and read every-
thing obtainable relating to the subject in general,
Edison's fertility of resource and originality come
into play. He will write in one of the laboratory
note-books a memorandum of the experiments to
be tried, and, if necessary, will illustrate by sketches.

This book is then given to one of the large staff
of experimenters. Here strenuousness and a prompt
carrying on of the work are required. The results
of each experiment must be recorded in the note-
book, and daily or more frequent reports are ex-
pected. Edison does not forget what is going on,
but in his daily tours through the laboratory keeps
in touch with the work of all the experimenters.
His memory is so keen and retentive that he is as
fully aware of the progress and details of each of the
numerous experiments constantly going on as if he
had made them all himself.

The use of laboratory note-books was begun early
in the Menlo Park days and has continued ever since.
They are plain blank-books, each about eight and a
half by six inches, containing about two hundred
pages. At the present time there are more than
one thousand of these books in the series. On their
pages are noted Edison's ideas, sketches, and memo-
randa, together with records of countless thousands
of experiments made by him or under his direction
during more than thirty years.

These two hundred thousand or more pages cover
investigations into every department of science,
showing the operations of a master mind seeking to
surprise Nature into a betrayal of her secrets by

218

METHOD IN INVENTING

asking her the same question in a hundred different
ways. The breadth of thought, thoroughness of
method, infinite detail, and minuteness of investiga-
tion proceeding from the workings of one mind
would surpass belief were they not shown by this
wonderful collection of note-books.

A remark made by one of the staff, who has been
experimenting at the laboratory for over twenty
years, is suggestive. He said: "Edison can think
of more ways of doing a thing than any man I ever
saw or heard of. He tries everything and never lets
up, even though failure is apparently staring him
in the face. He only stops when he simply can't go
any farther on that particular line. When he decides
on any mode of procedure he gives his notes to the
experimenter and lets him alone, only stopping in
from time to time to look at the operations and re-
ceive reports of progress."

The idea of attributing great successes to "genius"
has always been repudiated by Edison, as evidenced
by his historic remark that "genius is one per cent,
inspiration and ninety-nine per cent, perspiration."
Again, in a conversation many years ago between
Edison, Batchelor, and E. H. Johnson, the latter
made allusion to Edison's genius, when Edison re-
plied :

"Stuff! I tell you genius is hard work, stick-to-
it-iveness, and common sense."

"Yes," said Johnson, "I admit there is all that
to it, but there's still more. Batch and I have those
qualifications, but, although we knew quite a lot
about telephones, and worked hard, we couldn't in-

219

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

vent a brand-new non-infringing telephone receiver
as you did when Gouraud cabled for one. Then,
how about the subdivision of the electric light?"

"Electric current," corrected Edison.

"True," continued Johnson; "you were the one to
make that very distinction. The scientific world had
been working hard on subdivision for years, using
what appeared to be common sense. Results, worse
than nil. Then you come along, and about the first
thing you do, after looking the ground over, is to
start off^ in the opposite direction, which subsequently
proves to be the only possible way to reach the goal.
It seems to me that this is pretty close to the diction-
ary definition of genius."

It is said that Edison replied rather incoherently
and changed the topic of conversation.

This innate modesty, however, does not prevent
Edison from recognizing and classifying his own
methods of investigation. In a conversation with
two old associates a number of years ago he re-
marked : "It has been said of me that my methods
are empirical. That is true only so far as chemistry
is concerned. Did you ever realize that practically
all industrial chemistry is colloidal in its nature?
Hard rubber, celluloid, glass, soap, paper, and lots
of others, all have to deal with amorphous sub-
stances, as to which comparatively little has been
really settled. My methods are similar to those
followed by Luther Burbank. He plants an acre,
and when this is in bloom he inspects it. He has a
sharp eye, and can pick out of thousands a single
plant that has promise of what he wants. From this

220

METHOD IN INVENTING

he gets the seed, and uses his skill and knowledge
in producing from it a number of new plants which,
on development, furnish the means of propagating
an improved variety in large quantity. So, when I
am after a chemical result that I have in mind I may
make hundreds or thousands of experiments out of
which there may be one that promises results in the
right direction. This I follow up to its legitimate
conclusion, discarding the others, and usually get
what I am after. There is no doubt about this being
empirical ; but when it comes to problems of a me-
chanical nature, I want to tell you that all I've ever
tackled and solved have been done by hard, logical
thinking." The intense earnestness and emphasis
with which this was said were very impressive to the
auditors.

If, in following out his ideas, an experiment does
not show the results that Edison wants, it is not re-
garded as a failure, but as something learned. This
attitude is illustrated by his reply to Mr. Mallory,
who expressed regret that the first nine thousand
and odd experiments on the storage battery had been
without results. Edison replied, with a smile : ''Re-
sults ! Why, man, I have gotten a lot of results ! I
have found several thousand things that won't
work."

Edison's patient, plodding methods do not always
appear on the note-books. For instance, a sugges-
tion in one of them refers to a stringy, putty-like
mass being made of a mixture of lampblack and tar.
Some years afterward one of the laboratory as-

221

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

sistants was told to make some and roll it into fila-
ments. After a time he brought the mass to Edison
and said :

"There's something wrong about this, for it crum-
bles even after manipulating it with my fingers."

"How long did you knead it?" asked Edison.

"Oh, more than an hour," was the reply.

"Well, keep on for a few hours more and it will
come out all right," was the rejoinder. And this
proved to be correct.

With the experimenter or employee who exercises
thought Edison has unbounded patience, but to the
careless, stupid, or lazy person he is a terror for the
short time they remain around him. Once, when
asked why he had parted with a certain man, he
said : "Oh, he was so slow that it would take him
half an hour to get out of the field of a microscope."

Edison's practical way of testing a man's fitness
for special work is no joke, according to Mr. J. H.
Vail, formerly one of the Menlo Park staff. "I
wanted a job," he said, "and was ambitious to take
charge of the dynamo-room. Mr. Edison led me
to a heap of junk in a corner and said: 'Put that
together and let me know when it is running.' I
didn't know what it was, but received a liberal educa-
tion in finding out. It proved to be a dynamo, which
I finally succeeded in assembling and running. I got
the job."

A somewhat similar experience is related by Mr.
John F. Ott, who, in 1869, applied for work. This
is the conversation that took place, led by Edison's
question :

222

METHOD IN INVENTING

"What do you want?"

"Work."

"Can you make this machine work?" (exhibiting
it and explaining its details).

"Yes."

"Are you sure?"

"Well, you needn't pay me if I don't."

And thus Mr. Ott went to work and accomplished
the results desired. Two weeks afterward Edison
put him in charge of the shop. From that day to
this, Mr. Ott has remained a member of Mr. Edi-
son's staff.

Examples without number could be given of Edi-
son's inexhaustible fund of ideas, but one must suf-
fice by way of example. In the progress of the
ore-concentrating work one of the engineers sub-
mitted three sketches of a machine for some special
work. They were not satisfactory. He remarked
that it was too bad there was no other way to do the
work. Edison said, "Do you mean to say that these
drawings represent the only way to do this work?"
The reply was, "I certainly do." Edison said noth-
ing, but two days afterward brought in his own
sketches showing forty-eight other ways of accom-
plishing the result, and laid them on the engineer's
desk without a word. One of these ideas, with slight
changes, was afterward adopted.

This chapter could be continued to great length,
but must now be closed in the hope that in the fore-
going pages the reader may have caught an adequate
glance of Mr. Edison at work.

223

XXIV

Edison's laboratory at orange

T F Longfellow's youth "Who through an Alpine
■■- village passed" had been Edison, the word upon
his banner would probably not have been ''Excelsior"
but ''Experiment." This seems to be the watch-
word of his life, and is well illustrated by a remark
made to Mr. Mason, the superintendent of the ce-
ment works : "You must experiment all the time ;
if you don't the other fellow will, and then he will
get ahead of you."

For some years after closing the little laboratory
in his mother's cellar Edison made a laboratory of
any nook or corner and experimented as long as
he had a dollar in his pocket. The first place he
began to do larger things was in Newark, where he
established his first shops.

While life there was very strenuous, he tells of
some amusing experiences : "Some of my assistants
in those days were very green in the business. One
day I got a new man and told him to conduct a
certain experiment. He got a quart of ether and
started to boil it over a naked flame. Of course it
caught fire. The flame was about four feet in diam-
eter and eleven feet high. The fire department came
and put a stream through the window. That let all

224

LABORATORY AT ORANGE

the fumes and chemicals out and overcame the fire-
men.

"Another time we experimented with a tubful of
soapy water and put hydrogen into it to make large
bubbles. One of the boys, who was washing bottles
in the place, had read in some book that hydrogen
was explosive, so he proceeded to blow the tub up.
There was about four inches of soap in the bottom
of the tub, which was fourteen inches high, and he
filled it with soap-bubbles up to the rim. Then he
took a bamboo fish-pole, put a piece of lighted paper
at the end and touched it off. It blew every window
out of the place. '*

We have seen that Edison moved to Menlo Park,
where he had a very complete laboratory, in which
he brought out a large number of important inven-
tions. After a time, however, this establishment
was outgrown and lost many of its possibilities, and
he began to plan a still greater one which should be
the most complete of its kind in the world.

The Orange laboratory, as was originally planned,
consisted of a main building two hundred and fifty
feet long and three stories in height, together with
four other structures, each one hundred by twenty-
five feet and only one story in height. All these
were substantially built of brick. The main build-
ing was divided into five chief divisions — ^the library,
office, machine-shops, experimental and chemical
rooms, and stock-rooms. The small buildings were
to be used for various purposes.

A high picket fence, with a gate, surrounded these
buildings. A keeper was stationed at the gate with

225

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

instructions to admit no strangers without a pass.
On one occasion a new gateman was placed in charge,
and, not knowing Edison, refused to admit him until
he could get some one to come out and identify
him.

The library is a spacious room about forty by
thirty-five feet. Around the sides of the room run
two tiers of gallery. The main floor and the gal-
leries are divided into alcoves, in which, on the main
floor, are many thousands of books. In the galleries
are still more books and periodicals of all kinds, also
cabinets and shelves containing mineralogical and
geological specimens and thousands of samples of
ores and minerals from all parts of the world. In
a corner of one of the galleries may be seen a large
number of magazines relating to electricity, chemis-
try, engineering, mechanics, building, cement, build-
ing materials, drugs, water and gas power,
automobiles, railroads, aeronautics, philosophy, hy-
giene, physics, telegraphy, mining, metallurgy,
metals, music, and other subjects; also theatrical
weeklies, as well as the proceedings and transactions
of various learned and technical societies. All of
these form part of Mr. Edison's current reading. At
one end of the main floor of the library, which is
handsomely and comfortably furnished, is Mr. Edi-
son's desk, at which he may usually be seen for a
while in the early morning hours or at noon looking
over his mail.

The centre of the library is left open for the re-
ception of visitors, and one corner is partitioned off
to provide a private oflice for Mr. Edison's son,

226

LABORATORY AT ORANGE

Charles, who is the President and active manager of
the various Edison industries. Directly opposite to
the entrance-door is a beautiful marble statue repre-
senting the supremacy of electric light over gas.
This statue was purchased by Mr. Edison at the
Paris Exposition in 1889.

A glance at the book-shelves affords a revelation
of the subjects in which Edison is interested, for the
titles of the volumes include astronomy, botany,
chemistry, dynamics, electricity, engineering, for-
estry, geology, geography, mechanics, mining, medi-
cine, metallurgy, magnetism, philosophy, psychology,
physics, steam, steam-engines, telegraphy, telephony,
and many others. These are not all of Edison's
books by any means, for he has another big library in
his house on the hill.

Turning to pass out of the library, one's attention
is arrested by a cot standing in one of the alcoves
near the door. Sometimes during long working
hours Mr. Edison will throw himself down for a
nap. He has the ability to go to sleep instantly, and,
being deaf, noises do not disturb his slumber. The
instant he awakes he is in full possession of his
faculties and goes "back to the job" without a mo-
ment's hesitation.

Immediately outside the library is the famous
stock-room, about which much has been written.
Edison planned to have in this stock-room some
quantity, great or small, of every known substance
not easily perishable, together with the most com-
plete assortment of chemicals and drugs that expe-
rience and knowledge could suggest. His theory

22y

THE BOYS* LIFE OF EDISON

was, and is, that he does not know in advance what
he may want at any moment, and he planned to have
anything that could be thought of ready at hand.

Thus, the stock-room is not only a museum, but a
sample-room of nature, as well as a supply depart-
ment. At first glance the collection is bewildering,
but when classified is more easily comprehended.

The classification is natural, as, for instance, ob-
jects pertaining to various animals, birds, and fishes,
such as skins, hides, hair, fur, feathers, wool, quills,
down, bristles, teeth, bones, hoofs, horns, tusks,
shells ; natural products such as woods, barks, roots,
leaves, nuts, seeds, gums, grains, flowers, meals,
bran ; also minerals in great assortment ; mineral and
vegetable oils, clay, mica, ozokerite, etc. In the
line of textiles, cotton and silk threads in great va-
riety, with woven goods of all kinds, from cheese-
cloth to silk plush. As for paper, there is everything
in white and color, from thinnest tissue up to the
heaviest asbestos, even a few newspapers being al-
ways on hand. Twines of all sizes, inks, wax, cork,
tar, rosin, pitch, asphalt, plumbago, glass in sheets
and tubes, and a host of miscellaneous articles are re-
vealed on looking around the shelves, as well as an
interminable collection of chemicals including acids,
alkalies, salts, reagents, every conceivable essential
oil, and all the thinkable extracts. It may be re-
marked that this collection includes the eighteen
hundred or more fluorescent salts made by Edison
during his experiments for the best material for a
fluoroscope in the early X-ray period. All known
metals in form of sheet, rod, and tube, and of great

228

LABORATORY AT ORANGE

variety in thickness, are here found also, together
with a most complete assortment of tools and acces-
sories for machine-shop and laboratory work.

The list above given is not by any means complete.
In detail it would stretch out to a rather large cata-
logue. It is not by any means an idle collection,
for a stock clerk is kept busy all the day answering
demands upon him.

Beyond the stock -room is a good-sized machine-
shop, well equipped, in which the heavier class of
models and mechanical devices are made. Attached
to these are the engine-room and boiler-room.
Above, on the second floor, is another machine-shop,
in which is carried on work of greater precision
and fineness in the construction of tools and experi-
mental models.

There are many experimental rooms on the second
and third floors of the laboratory building. In these
the various experimenters are at work carrying out
the ideas of Mr. Edison on the great variety of sub-
jects to which he is constantly devoting his atten-
tion. One cannot go far in the upper floors without
being aware that efforts are being made to improve
the phonograph, for the sounds of vocal and instru-
mental music can be heard from all sides.

On the third floor the visitor may see a number of
glass-fronted cabinets containing a multitude of ex-
perimental incandescent lamps, and an immense
variety of models of phonographs, motors, telegraph
and telephone apparatus, and a host of other in-
ventions, upon which Mr. Edison's energies have at
one time or other been bent. Here are also many

229

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

boxes of historical instruments and models. In fact,
this hallway, with its variety of contents, may well
be considered a scientific attic.

In the early days of the Orange laboratory some
of the upper rooms contained cots for the benefit of
the night-workers. In spite of the strenuous nights
and days the spirit of fun was frequently in evidence.
One instance will serve as an illustration.

One morning about two-thirty the late Charles
Batchelor said he was tired and would go to bed.
Leaving Edison and the others busily working, he
went out and returned quietly in slippered feet, with
his night-gown on, the handle of a feather-duster
down his back with the feathers waving over his
head, and his face marked. With unearthly howls
and shrieks, a V Indicn, he pranced about the room,
incidentally giving Edison a scare that made him
jump up from his work. He saw the joke quickly,
however, and joined in the general merriment caused
by this prank.

A description of the laboratory building would be
incomplete without mention of room Number 12.
This is one of Edison's favorite rooms, where he
may frequently be found seated at a plain table in the
center of the room deeply intent on one of his nu-
merous problems. It is a plain little room, but seems
to exercise a nameless fascination for him.

Passing out of the building, we come to the four
smaller buildings, which are known as Numbers
One, Two, Three, and Four. The building Number
One is called the galvanometer room. Edison orig-
inally planned that this should be used for the most

230

LABORATORY AT ORANGE

delicate and minute electrical measurements. He
went to great expense in fitting it up and in providing
a large number of costly instruments, but the coming
of the trolley near by a few years afterward ren-
dered the room utterly useless for this purpose. It
is now used as an experimental room, chiefly for
motion-picture experiments.

Building Number Two is quite an important one.
As the visitor arrives at the door he is quite con-
scious that it is a chemical-room. Here a corps
of chemists is constantly kept busy in carrying out
the various experiments Mr. Edison has given them
to perform. This room is also one of his special
haunts. He may be seen here very frequently ex-
perimenting in person, or seated at a plain little table
figuring out some new combination that he has in
mind.

A chemical store-room and a pattern-maker's
shop occupy building Number Three, while Number
Four, which was formerly used for ore concentrating
experiments, is now used as a general stock-room.

We have only attempted to afford the reader a
passing glance of this interesting laboratory, which
for many years has been the headquarters of Edison
and the central source of inspiration for the great
industries he has established at Orange. Around it
are grouped a number of immense concrete buildings
in which the manufacture of phonographs, motion-
pictures, and storage batteries is carried on, giving
employment to as many as four thousand people dur-
ing busy times.

231

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

Needless to say, the laboratory has many visitors.
Celebrities of all kinds and distinguished foreigners
are numerous, coming from all parts of the world
to see the great inventor and the scene of his
activities.

232

XXV

EDISON HIMSELF

LET US turn from what Edison has done to what
J Edison is. It is worth while to know "the man
behind the guns." Who and what is the personal
Edison ?

Certainly there must be tremendous force in a
personality which has been one of the most potent
factors in bringing into existence new industries
now capitalized at tens of billions of dollars, earn-
ing annually sums running into billions, and giving
employment to an army of more than two million
people.

It must not be thought that there is any inten-
tion to give entire credit to Edison for the present
magnificent proportions of these industries. The
labors of many other inventors and the confidence
of capitalists and investors have added greatly to
their growth. But Edison is the father of some of
these arts and industries, and as to some of the
others it was the magic of his touch that helped make
them practicable.

How then does Edison differ from most other
men? Is it that he combines with a vigorous body
a mind capable of clear and logical thinking, and an
imagination of unusual activity? No, for there are

^11

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

others of equal bodily and mental vigor who have
not accomplished a tithe of his achievements.

We must answer then, first, that his whole life is
concentrated upon his work. When he conceives a
broad idea of a new invention he gives no thought
to the limitations of time, or man, or effort. Having
his body and mind in complete subjection through
iron nerves, he settles down to experiment with
ceaseless, tireless, unwavering patience, never swerv-
ing to the right or left nor losing sight of his pur-
pose. Years may come and go, but nothing short of
success is accepted.

A good example of this can be found in the devel-
opment of the nickel pocket for the storage battery,
an element the size of a short lead-pencil. More than
five years were spent in experiments costing upward
of a million dollars to perfect it. Day after day w^as
spent on this investigation, tens of thousands of
tubes and an endless variety of chemicals were made,
but at the end of five years Edison was as much in-
terested in these small tubes as when the work was
first begun.

So far as work is concerned, all times are alike to
Edison, whether it be day or night. He carries no
watch, and, indeed, has but little use for watches or
clocks except as they may be useful in connection
with an experiment in which time is a factor. The
one idea in mind is to go on with the work inces-
santly, always pushing steadily onward toward the
purpose in view, with a relentless disregard of effort
or the passage of time.

A second and very marked characteristic of Edi-

234

THOMAS ALVA EDISON — IQII

EDISON HIMSELF

son's personality is an intense and courageous hope-
fulness and self-confidence, into which no thought of
failure can enter. The doubts and fears of others
have absolutely no weight with him. Discourage-
ments and disappointments find no abiding place in
his mind. Indeed, he has the happy faculty of begin-
ning the day as open-minded as a child, yesterday's
discouragements and disappointment discarded, or,
at any rate, remembered only as useful knowledge
gained and serving to point out the fact that he had
been temporarily following the wrong road.

Difficulties seem to have a fascination for him.
To advance along smooth paths, meeting no obsta-
cles or hardships, has no charm for Edison. To
wrestle with difficulties, to meet obstructions, to at-
tempt the impossible — ^these are the things that ap-
pear to give him a high form of intellectual pleasure.
He meets them with the keen delight of a strong man
battling with the waves and opposing them in sheer
enjoyment.

Another marked characteristic of Edison is the
fact that his happiness is not bound up in the making
of money. While he appreciates a good balance at
his banker's, the keenness of his pleasure is in over-
coming difficulties rather than the mere piling up of
a bank account. Had his nature been otherwise, it
is doubtful if his life would have been filled with the
great achievements that it has been our pleasure
to record.

In a life filled with tremendous purpose and bril-
liant achievement there must be expected more or
less of troubles and loss. Edison's life has been no

235

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

exception, but, with the true philosophy that might
be expected of such a nature, he remarked recently :
"Spilled milk doesn't interest me. I have spilled lots
of it, and, while I have always felt it for a few
days, it is quickly forgotten, and I turn again to the
future."

Edison to-day has a fine physique, and, being free
from serious ailments, enjoys a vigorous old age.
His hair has whitened, but it is still abundant, and
though he uses glasses for reading, his gray-blue
eyes are as keen and bright and deeply lustrous as
ever, with the direct, searching look in them that
they have ever worn.

Edison in his 'eighties still has a fine physique,
weighs over one hundred and sixty-five pounds, and
has varied little as to weight in the last forty years.
He is very abstemious, hardly ever touching alcohol
and caring little for meat. In fact, the chief article
of his diet is warm milk, which he finds satisfactory
for his need.

He believes that people eat too much, and governs
himself accordingly. His meals are simple, small in
quantity, and take but little of his time at table. If
he finds himself varying in weight he will eat a little
more or a little less in order to keep his weight
constant.

As to clothes, Edison is simplicity itself. Indeed,
it is one of the subjects in which he takes no interest.
He says: "I get a suit that fits me, then I compel
the tailors to use that as a jig, or pattern, or blue-
print, to make others by. For many years a suit
was used as a measurement ; once or twice they took

236

EDISON HIMSELF

fresh measurements, but these didn't fit, and they
had to go back. I eat to keep my weight constant,
hence I never need changed measurements."

This will explain why a certain tailor had made
Edison's clothes for twenty years and had never
seen him.

In 1873 Mr. Edison was married to Miss Mary
Stilwell, who died in 1884, leaving three children —
Thomas Alva, William Leslie, and Marion Estelle.

Mr. Edison was married again in 1886 to Miss
Mina Miller, daughter of Mr. Lewis Miller, a dis-
tinguished pioneer inventor and manufacturer in the
field of agricultural machinery, and equally entitled
to fame as the father of the "Chautauqua idea," and
the founder with Bishop Vincent of the original
Giautauqua, which now has so many replicas all
over the country. By this marriage there are three
children — Charles, Madeline, and Theodore.

For over twenty years Edison's happy and perfect
domestic life has been spent at Glenmont, a beautiful
property in Llewellyn Park, on the Orange Moun-
tain, New Jersey. Here, amid the comforts of a
beautifully appointed home, in which may be seen
the many decorations and medals awarded to him,
together with the numerous souvenirs sent to him
by foreign potentates and others, Edison spends the
hours that he is away from the laboratory. They
are far from being idle hours, for it is here that he
may pursue his reading free from interruption.

His hours of sleep are few, not more than six in
the twenty- four, and not as much as that when work-
ing nights at the laboratory. In a recent conversa-

237

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

tion a friend expressed surprise that he could stand
the constant strain, to which Edison repHed that he
stood it easily, because he was interested in every-
thing. He further said : *1 don't live with the past ;
I am living for to-day and to-morrow. I am inter-
ested in every department of science, art, and manu-
facture. I read all the time on astronomy, chemis-
try, biology, physics, music, metaphysics, mechanics,
and other branches — apolitical economy, electricity,
and, in fact, all things that are making for progress
in the world. I get all the proceedings of the scien-
tific societies, the principal scientific and trade jour-
nals, and read them. I also read some theatrical and
sporting papers and a lot of similar publications, for
I like to know what is going on. In this way I keep
up to date, and live in a great, moving world of my
own, and, what's more, I enjoy every minute of it."

In conversation Edison is direct, courteous, ready
to discuss a topic with anybody worth talking to,
and, in spite of his deafness, an excellent listener.
No one ever goes away from him in doubt as to what
he thinks or means, but, with characteristic modesty,
he is ever shy and diffident to a degree if the talk
turns on himself rather than on his work.

He is a normal, fun-loving, typical American, ever
ready to listen to a new story, with a smile all the
while, and a hearty, boyish laugh at the end. He
has a keen sense of humor, which manifests itself in
witty repartee and in various ways.

In his association with his staff of experimenters
the *'old man," as he is affectionately called, is con-
siderate and patient, although always insisting on

238

EDISON HIMSELF

absolute accuracy and exactness in carrying out his
ideas. He makes liberal allowance for errors arising
through human weakness of one kind or another,
but a stupid mistake or an inexcusable oversight on
the part of an assistant will call forth a storm of con-
temptuous expression that is calculated to make the
offender feel cheap. The incident, however, is
quickly a thing of the past, as a general rule.

If there is anything in heredity, Edison has many
years of vigor and activity yet before him. What
the future may have in store in the way of further
achievement cannot be foreshadowed, for he is still
a mighty thinker and a prodigy of industry and hard
work.

239

XXVI

Edison's new phonograph

As RELATED in a preceding chapter of this work,
the first commercial phonograph was of the
wax cyHnder type. Celluloid afterwards superceded
wax as a material for the cylinder record, because
of its indestructibility. Edison's work on the disc
phonograph and record, invented by him in 1878,
is related in the following pages.

From the time of his conception of the phono-
graph in 1877 to the present day Edison has
had a deep conviction that people want good music
in their homes. That this is not a conviction founded
upon commercialism may be appreciated on reading
his own words: "Of all the various forms of en-
tertainment in the home, I know of nothing that
compares with music. It is safe and sane, appeals
to all finer emotions, and tends to bind family influ-
ences with a wholesomeness that links old and young
together. If you will consider for a moment how
universally the old 'heart songs' are loved in the
homes, you will realize what a deep hold music has
in the affections of the people. It is a safety-valve
in the home."

Throughout the years that followed the advent
of the earlier type of phonograph with the cylindrical
wax records Edison never lost sight of his deter-

240

EDISON'S NEW PHONOGRAPH

mination to make it a more perfect instrument, for,
of all the children of his brain, the phonograph seems
to be the one he loves most. He is the most severe
critic of his own work and is never content with less
than the best obtainable.

Thus it came about that, some thirteen years ago,
having reached the apex of his dissatisfaction with
what he thought were the shortcomings of the
phonograph and records of that time, he began work
on a long-cherished plan of refining the machine
and the records so that he could reproduce music,
vocal and instrumental, with all its original beauty
of tone and sweetness — in fact, a true "re-creation."
As the world knows, he has succeeded.

With his characteristic vigor and earnestness Edi-
son plunged into this campaign, fully realizing the
immense difficulties of the task he had undertaken.
In order to accomplish the desired end he must, in
the first place, devise entirely new types of recorder
and reproducer which would have essentially differ-
ent characteristics from any then in existence. In
addition to this, an entirely new material must be
found and adapted for the surface of the records, a
material pliable, indestructible, and, above all, so
exceedingly smooth that there should be no rasping,
scratching sounds to mar the beauty of the music.

In planning this campaign Edison had decided to
return to the disc type of machine and record, which
he had invented away back in 1878, and which he
now took up again, as it would afford him the great-
est scope for his latest efforts.

While simultaneously carrying on a formidable
241

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

line of experiments to produce the desired material
for the records he labored patiently through the days
and away into the nights for many months in evolv-
ing the new recorder and reproducer, pausing only
to snatch a few hours of sleep, which sometimes
would be taken at home and at other times on a
bench or cot in the laboratory. After some thou-
sands of experiments, extending over a period of
more than ten months and conducted with the never-
wearying patience so characteristic of him, he per-
fected his recorder and the diamond-point repro-
ducer which gave him the results for which he strove
so many years. This was on the eve of his depar-
ture for Europe in August, 191 1.

When Edison thinks he has perfected any device
his next step is to find out its weakness by trying his
best to destroy it. Illustrative of this there may be
quoted two instances of severe tests in connection
with his alkaline storage battery. After completing
it he rigged up a device by means of which a set of
batteries were subjected to a series of 1,700,000
severe bumps in the effort to destroy them. When
this failed, they were mounted on a heavy electric
car, which was propelled with terrific force a number
of times against a heavy stone wall, only to show
that they were proof against injury by any such
means.

His new phonograph reproducer was not ex-
empted from this policy of attempted destruction,
and before leaving for Europe he gave instructions
for a grilling test, which was, of course, carried out
faithfully, but the diamond point was found to be

242

EDISON'S NEW PHONOGRAPH

uninjured after playing records more than four
thousand times. With such results he deemed it a
safe proposition.

On his return from Europe in October, 191 1,
Edison resumed his attack on the evolution of the
new indestructible disc record with a smooth surface,
the main principles of which had been determined
upon before his departure. In addition, there arose
the problem of manufacturing such records in great
quantities. The difficulties that confronted him
completely baffle description. The whole battle was
carried on with the aid of powerful microscopes,
which even at their best vv^ould fail to reveal the ob-
scure cause of temporary discomfiture. Differences
in material, dirt, dust, temperature, water, chemical
action, thumb marks, breath marks, cloth and brush
marks, and a host of major and minor incidentals,
were patiently and painstakingly investigated with a
thoroughness that is almost beyond belief to the
layman.

Day and night the work was carried on inces-
santly. During the height of the investigation, to-
ward the close of this five-year campaign, Edison
and a few of his faithful experimenters — facetiously
called ''The Insomnia Squad" — stayed steadily at the
works for a period of over five weeks — eating,
drinking, working, and sleeping (occasionally)
there. During that time Edison went home only
four or five times, and then merely to change his
clothing. He and the men slept for short periods
in the works or in the library, on benches and tables,
resuming their labors immediately on waking up.

243

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

Edison had arranged for an abundant supply of
good substantial food which they themselves cooked,
hence the inner man was well cared for. The wives
of the men came around at intervals with changes
of clothing for their husbands. This intense applica-
tion to work left no time for shaving, with the result
that all hands might well have been taken for a gang
of traditional pirates from their unkempt appear-
ance.

They were all happy, however, and, strange to
say, all increased in weight, although a contrary re-
sult might naturally have been expected. The intense
work has never ceased, but there has been no similar
protracted siege since, as the main principles were
practically settled at that time. The foregoing in-
stance has been merely mentioned to illustrate the
fierce vigor with which Edison works when he is
seeking to complete one of his inventions. He has
been, and still is, prosecuting his labors with the
same energy to bring about the utmost perfection
that is possible.

He has not confined his work to the refinement of
the merely mechanical parts, such as the instrument
and the records, but during the last ten years he has
devoted an immense amount of time to music itself.
Becoming convinced that the public desired really
beautiful music, he set himself to a thorough study
of the subject, not only of compositions, but also of
the human voice, its powers and limitations, and of
different effects of various styles of orchestration.
He determined to hear for himself music of all kinds,
and with this object in view hired a number of sight-

244

EDISON'S NEW PHONOGRAPH

reading players and singers to render musical selec-
tions by the hour.

In the past ten years he has heard upward of
twenty-five thousand compositions of a wide range,
from grand opera to ragtime. As he hears them
he indicates his opinions, which range from "beau-
tiful" to *'punk," according to his idea of availabil-
ity for the phonograph. An elaborate card system
preserves these indications for further application
in selecting music for the phonograph.

It might seem dogmatic to have the reproduction
of musical compositions depend upon his opinion,
but it must be said that he is not entirely committed
to such drastic measures if there is a real demand
for some musical selection which does not seem to
merit his good opinion. His decision as to a com-
position is not based on a merely personal whim or
fad, but upon his opinion of it from the standpoint
of an inventor. He has said to the writer more than
once: "There is invention in music just as much as
in the arts. Composers such as Verdi, Rossini,
Bellini, Donizetti were inventors. They did not
copy, nor did some of the other great composers.
But the rank and file of musicians are not inventors ;
they have copied the ideas of the others, consciously
or unconsciously. If you will sit down for a few
hours and have a lot of miscellaneous compositions
played you will be convinced of it."

Edison has had no musical training, as the term is
generally understood, and the writer must confess
that before hearing the above expression he failed
to comprehend the true basis of the inventor's opin-

245

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

ions of the various compositions played or sung for
him. On several occasions he therefore arranged
(unknown to Edison) to have one or more com-
positions played or sung again after a lapse of some
weeks, to see whether or not there would be any
similarity of opinion to that first indicated. In every
case Edison's judgment was practically, and in some
cases precisely, the same as before, thus proving that
the opinion first given was not merely a whim, but
was based upon some definite line of thought in the
inventor's brain.

His excursion into the musical realm has also
included the personal hearing of many singers so
as to determine their fitness for making phonograph
records. This proved to be a wonderfully interest-
ing field of investigation, and he has given a great
deal of time to it, listening critically to each voice,
good, bad, or indifferent, and patiently writing out
his criticism in each case. Not only has he heard a
large number of singers who have visited the labo-
ratory for the purpose, but he also had a representa-
tive scouring Europe for voices several years ago.
This man visited the principal cities and towns of
Europe and took phonograph records of the voices
of the operatic and other prominent singers in each
place and shipped them over to Edison, who listened
to each one and recorded his opinion in a series of
note-books kept for the purpose. He has in the labo-
ratory at Orange nearly two thousand voice records
of this kind. All this is done with the object of
securing the really best voices in the world. Prob-

246

EDISON'S NEW PHONOGRAPH

ably this is the most unique "voice library" in ex-
istence.

He is very deaf, but has a wonderfully acute inner
ear, which, being protected by his deafness from the
ordinary sounds of life, will catch minute imperfec-
tions that are imperceptible to the person of ordinary
hearing. In listening to a voice he uses a peculiarly
shaped horn which is held close to the ear, and such
is the acuteness of his hearing that he at once dis-
tinguishes minute changes of register, extra waves,
tremolo, non-periodic vibrations, and other minor
defects that detract from the true beauty of vocal
sounds. In addition, he can immediately recognize
the number of overtones and rate of tremolo, which
may afterward be verified by a microscopic examina-
tion of a record of the same voice.

Edison contends that the phonograph will give
the ''acid test" of a voice, for it will record nothing
more and nothing less than what is in the voice
itself, and the record is unchangeable. In his judg-
ment, operatic voices are not necessarily the most
perfect ones, for, as he says: "the vocal cords of
opera singers are always at the straining-point.
They usually sing on roomy stages in large theaters
with a large orchestra in front of them, and their
voices must go out above all these instruments so
as to be heard to the farthest limits of the house.
Consequently, they are always doing their utmost
and their vocal cords become adapted to heavy work
only. People often wonder why their favorite op-
eratic singers do not charm them as much in concert
or through the phonograph as they did at the opera,

247

THE BOYS* LIFE OF EDISON

but do not stop to think of the difference between
the opera-house and the concert-hall or parlor. I
don't mean to say a word of detraction in regard
to operatic singers, for I have a great admiration for
their wonderful art and for many of their voices,
and a great number of them have now recognized
the value of special effort to acquire the distinct art
and technique of singing for the phonograph (which
is a parlor instrument), and have made some really
beautiful records."

The writer was one day discussing with Edison
the temperament of singers generally and the good
opinion that each one usually has of his or her own
voice irrespective of any artistic use he or she could
make of it. He said : *'I don't see what they have
to be conceited about. The Almighty has given them
a little piece of meat in their throats that differs
slightly from the corresponding piece of meat in
somebody else's throat. They can take no credit for
that, but if they use their brains to interpret and
perfect the use of what has been given them, they
have accomplished something. What I want is
voices that will stand the test of the phonograph and
give permanent pleasure to people, irrespective of
stage environment, or the press agent, or pleasing
personality."

This chapter could be extended to a great length
in setting forth the results of Edison's deep study
of music which he undertook solely for the purpose
of bringing his latest achievement up to the high
standard which he set for it so many years ago, but
enough has been said to indicate the immense amount

248

EDISON'S NEW PHONOGRAPH

of work he has done and the trend of his ideas. That
he has been able, amid the round of his multitudi-
nous duties and work, which occupy his time and
attention from sixteen to eighteen hours a day, to
delve into the subject so profoundly and to evolve
ideas that are confessedly awakening the musical
world is sufficient to indicate that in spite of his years
and herculean labors in the past he has not lost any
of the vim or pertinacity that have so distinguished
him in days gone by.

249

XXVII
Edison's work during the war

WITH the shattering of the world's peace by the
great conflict which commenced on July 28,
19 14, there came a universal disturbance of indus-
trial conditions. The Edison industries were not
exempt.

Edison's activities during the years of the war
were of the same intensely vigorous and energetic
nature so characteristic of him throughout his busy
life. His work during this period is divisible into
two distinct sections : first, the working out of proc-
esses and the design and construction of nine chemi-
cal and two benzol plants to supply chemicals and
materials greatly needed by our country; and, sec-
ond, his war work for the United States government.
We will discuss these in the above order.

For many years before the war America had
been a large importer of raw materials and manu-
factured products from England, Germany, and
other European countries. Among these may be
mentioned potash, dyes, carbolic acid, aniline oil,
and other coal-tar products. After hostilities began
the activities of the Allied fleets prevented all expor-
tations by Germany and the Central Powers. On
the other hand, England and her allies placed em-
bargoes on the exportation from their countries of

250

EDISON'S WORK DURING THE WAR

all materials and products which could be used for
food or munitions of war.

Thus there suddenly came a great embarrassment
to numerous American industries. By reason of our
continued importation for many years our country
had become dependent upon Europe for supplies of
various products and had made practically no provi-
sion for the manufacture of these products within
our own borders.

Inasmuch as our narrative concerns Edison and
his work, we shall not attempt to name all the indus-
tries thus affected, but will confine ourselves to a
mention of the items relating to his own needs and
of those which he promptly took steps to produce for
the relief of many industries and for the general
good of the country. These items were carbolic acid,
aniline oil, myrbane, aniline salts, acetanilid, para-
nitro-acetanilid, paraphenylenediamine, para-amido-
phenol, benzidine, benzol, toluol, xylol, solvent
naphtha, and naphthaline flakes.

Edison's principal requirements were potash for
his storage battery and carbolic acid and para-
phenylenediamine for use in the manufacture of disc
phonograph records. After a great deal of experi-
menting he found that caustic soda could be used in
his storage battery and therefore employed it until
new supplies of potash were obtainable.

Carbolic acid and paraphenylenediamine had been
previously imported from England and Germany
and as there was practically none produced in the
United States and no possibility of substituting other
products Edison realized that he would be compelled

251

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

to manufacture them himself, as the source of supply
was cut off. He, therefore, as usual, gathered to-
gether all available literature and plunged into a
study of manufacturing processes and quickly set
his chemists to work on various lines of experiment.

Having decided through these experiments on the
process by which he would manufacture carbolic acid
synthetically, Edison designed his first plant, gath-
ered the building material and apparatus together
and instructed his engineers to rush the construction
as fast as possible. By working gangs of men
twenty- four hours a day the plant was rapidly com-
pleted and on the eighteenth day after the work of
construction was begun it commenced turning out
carbolic acid. Within a month this plant was mak-
ing more than a ton a day and gradually increased its
capacity until, a few months afterward, it reached
its maximum of six tons a day.

It soon became publicly known that Edison was
manufacturing carbolic acid, and he was over-
whelmed with offers to purchase the excess over his
own requirements. The demand for carbolic acid
became so great that he decided to erect a second
plant. This was quickly constructed and its capacity,
which was also six tons per day, was contracted for
before the plant was fully completed. It is interest-
ing to note that the army and navy departments of
the United States were among the first to make long
contracts with Edison for his carbolic acid, from
which they made explosives that were badly needed.

We must digress here to show an emergency that
had arisen during the early days of the first carbolic-

252

EDISON'S WORK DURING THE WAR

acid plant. There had come about a serious short-
age of benzol, which is a basic material in the manu-
facture of synthetic carbolic acid. Benzol is a
product derived from the gases arising from the de-
structive distillation of coal in coke ovens. At the
time of which we are writing (beginning of 191 5)
there was only a comparatively small quantity of
benzol produced in the United States.

Mr. Edison realized that without a continuous and
liberal supply of benzol he would be unable to carry
out his project of producing carbolic acid in large
quantities. He had also been approached by various
textile manufacturers to make aniline oil, which was
essential to their continuance in business, and of
which there was practically no supply in the country.
Without it he could not make paraphenylenediamine.
Benzol is also a basic material in making aniHne oil.

Therefore, it became doubly important to arrange
for an adequate and continuous supply of benzol.
Edison made a study of the methods and processes
of producing benzol and then made proposals to
various steel companies to the effect that he would,
with their permission, erect a benzol plant at their
coke ovens, operate the same at his own expense,
and pay them a royalty for every gallon of benzol,
toluol, xylol, or solvent naphtha taken from their
gases. Such arrangement would not only meet his
requirements, but at the same time would give the
steel companies an income from something which
they had been allowing to pass away into the air.
He succeeded in making arrangements with two of
the companies — namely, the Cambria Steel Company

253

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

at Johnstown, Pennsylvania, and the Woodward
Iron Company, Woodward, Alabama.

Ordinarily, it requires from nine to ten months
to erect a benzol plant, but before making his pro-
posal to the steel companies Edison had worked out
a plan for erecting a practical plant within sixty days,
and had laid it out on paper. He was sure of his
grounds, because from his vast experience he knew
where to pick up the different pieces of apparatus in
various parts of the country.

The contract for his first benzol plant at Johns-
town, Pennsylvania, was signed on January i8,
191 5, and the actual work was begun an hour after
the contract was signed, with the final result that
in forty-five days afterward the benzol plant was
completed and commenced working successfully.
The second plant, at Woodward, Alabama, was com-
pleted within sixty days after breaking ground, the
two weeks difference in time being accounted for
by the fact that Woodward was farther away from
the base of supplies and there were delays in rail-
road transportation of materials.

Being sure, through these contracts, of a continu-
ous supply of benzol, Edison designed a plant for
making aniline oil. By working gangs of men day
and night, the erection of this plant was completed
in forty-five days. The capacity of the plant, four
thousand pounds per day, was fully contracted for
by anxious manufacturers long before the machinery
was in place.

Let us now consider Edison's work on parapheny-
lenediamine. This is a chemical product which is

254

EDISON'S WORK DURING THE WAR

largely used in dyeing furs black. America had im-
ported all her requirements from Germany, but
within a few months after the beginning of hostili-
ties the visible supply was exhausted and no more
could be expected during war-times. Fur-dyers were
in despair. This product being also absolutely essen-
tial in the manufacture of phonograph records, Edi-
son worked out a process for making it, and as his
requirements were very moderate he established a
small manufacturing plant at the Orange laboratory
and soon began to produce about twenty-five pounds
a day. In some way the news reached the ears of
many desperate fur-dyers, and Edison was quickly
besieged with most urgent requests for such portion
of his output as could be spared. Fortunately, a
small proportion of the output was available and was
distributed daily in accordance with the necessities
of those concerned. This small quantity being
merely a drop in the bucket, the fur-dyers earnestly
besought Edison to establish a larger plant and
supply them with greater quantities of parapheny-
lenediamine, as their business had come almost to
a standstill for lack of it. He, therefore, designed
and constructed rapidly a larger plant, which, when
put into operation, was soon producing two hundred
to three hundred pounds a day, thus saving the situa-
tion for the fur-dyers. The capacity of this plant
was gradualy increased until it turned out upward of
a thousand pounds a day, of which a goodly pro-
portion was exported to Europe and Japan.

Lack of space has prevented the narration of more
than a mere general outline of some of Edison's

255

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

important achievements during part of the war years
along chemical and engineering lines and in furnish-
ing many of the industries of the country with
greatly needed products that, for a time at least, were
otherwise unobtainable. Much could be written
about his work on producing myrbane, aniline salts,
acetanilid, para-nitro-acetanilid, para-amido-phenol,
benzidine, toluol, xylol, solvent naphtha, and naph-
thaline flakes — how his investigations and experi-
ments on them ran along with the others, team
fashion, so to speak, how he brought the same re-
sourcefulness and energy to bear on many problems,
and how he eventually surmounted numerous diffi-
culties— ^but limitations of space forbid. Nor can
we make more than a mere passing mention of the
assistance he gave to the governments in the quick
production of toluol and in furnishing plans and help
to construct and operate two toluol plants in Canada.
Suffice it to say that his achievements during this epi-
sode in his career were fully in accord with the
notable successes he had already scored. It may be
noted that in the three years following 19 14 others
went into the business of manufacturing the above
chemicals, and as they installed and operated plants
and furnished supplies needed in the industries Edi-
son withdrew and shut down his special plants one
after another.

Let us now take a brief glance at the patriot-in-
ventor at work for his government in war-times and
especially during the last two years of the Great
War.

In the late summer of 191 5 the Secretary of the

256/

EDISON'S WORK DURING THE WAR

Na\^, Hon. Josephus Daniels, communicated to Mr.
Edison an idea he had conceived of gathering to-
gether a body of men preeminent in inventive re-
search to form an advisory board which should come
to the aid of our country in an inventive and advisory
capacity in relation to war measures. In this com-
munication Secretary Daniels made an appeal to
Edison's patriotism and asked him to devote some of
his effort in the service of the country and also to
act as chairman of the board. Although he was
already working about eighteen hours a day, Edison
signified his consent. In the fall of 191 5 the board
was organized and subsequently became known as
the Naval Consulting Board of the United States.
Mr. Edison was at first chairman and subsequently
became president of the board.

The history of the work and activities of the board
is too extensive to be related here in detail and can
only be hinted at. Indeed, it is the subject of a sepa-
rate volume which is being published by the Navy
Department. We shall, therefore, confine our narra-
tive to the story of Edison's work.

In December, 19 16, Secretary Daniels expressed
a desire that Mr. Edison visit him in Washington
for an important conference. At that time it seemed
almost inevitable that the United States would be
drawn into the conflict with Germany sooner or
later, and at the conference Secretary Daniels asked
Edison to devote more of his time to the country by
undertaking experiments on a series of problems, a
list of which was handed to him.

Edison signified his assent, agreeing to give his

257

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

whole time to the government without charge, and
returned to his laboratory. He immediately put
everything else aside, and with characteristic enthusi-
asm and energy delved into the work he had under-
taken. The problems referred to covered a wide
range of the sciences and arts, and time being an
essential element, he added to his laboratory staff by
gathering together from various sources a number
of young men, experts in various lines, to assist him
in his investigations.

Inasmuch as Edison's war work for the govern-
ment occupied his entire time for upward of two
years, it is manifestly out of the question to narrate
the details within the limits of a chapter. We must,
therefore, be content to itemize the principal prob-
lems upon which he occupied himself and assistants
and as to which he reported definite results to Wash-
ington. The items are as follows :

1. Locating position of guns by sound-ranging.

2. Detecting submarines by sound from moving

vessels.

3. Detecting on moving vessels the discharge of

torpedoes by submarines.

4. Quick turning of ships.

5. Strategic plans for saving cargo boats from

submarines.

6. Collision mats.

7. Taking merchant-ships out of mined harbors.

8. Oleum cloud shells.

9. Camouflaging ships and burning anthracite.
10. More power for torpedoes.

258

EDISON'S WORK DURING THE WAR

1 1. Coast patrol by submarine buoys.

12. Destroying periscopes with machine-guns.

13. Cartridge for taking soundings.

14. SaiHng-Hghts for convoys.

15. Smudging sky-Hne.

16. Obstructing torpedoes with nets.

17. Under- water search-light.

18. High-speed signaling with search-lights.

19. Water-penetrating projectile.

20. Airplane detection.

21. Observing periscopes in silhouette.

22. Steamship decoys.

23. Zigzagging.

24. Reducing rolling of warships.

25. Obtaining nitrogen from the air.

26. Stability of submerged submarines.
2J. Hydrogen detector for submarines.

28. Induction balance for submarine detection.

29. Turbine head for projectile.

30. Protecting observers from smoke-stack gas.

31. Mining Zeebrugge harbor.

2^2. Blinding submarines and periscopes.

33. Mirror-reflection system for warships.

34. Device for look-out men.

35. Extinguishing fires in coal bunkers.

36. Telephone system on ships.

:>^y. Extension ladder for spotting-top.

38. Preserving submarine and other guns from

rust.

39. Freeing range-finder from spray.

40. Smudging periscopes.

259

THE BOYS^ LIFE OF EDISON

41. Night glass.

42. Re-acting shell.

It will be seen that Mr, Edison's inventive imag-
ination was permitted a wide scope. He fairly rev-
eled in the opportunity of attacking so many difficult
problems and worked through the days and nights
with unflagging enthusiasm. He committed his
business interests to the care of his associates, and
during the two years of his work for the govern-
ment kept in touch with his great business interests
only by means of reports which were condensed to
the utmost. In addition, for two successive winters,
he gave up his regular winter vacation on his Florida
estate, usually a source of great enjoyment to him.
But it was all done willingly and without a word of
regret or dissatisfaction so far as the writer's knowl-
edge goes.

Although we cannot take space to discuss the
above items in detail, the reader will probably have
a desire to know something of Edison's work in re-
gard to the submarines.

In view of the vast destruction of shipping, per-
haps it is not an overstatement to say that the most
vital problem of the late war was to overcome the
menace of the submarine. Undoubtedly there was
more universal study and experiment on means and
devices for locating and destroying submarines than
on any other single problem.

The class of apparatus most favored by investiga-
tors comprised various forms of listening devices by
means of which it was hoped to detect and locate by

260

EDISON'S WORK DURING THE WAR

sound the movement of an entirely submerged sub-
marine. The difficulties in obtaining accurate results
were very great even when the observing vessel was
motionless, but were enormously enhanced on using
listening devices on a vessel under way, on account
of the noises of the vessel itself, the rushing of the
water, and so on.

Edison's earliest efforts were confined to the in-
duction balance, but after two months of intensive
experimenting on that line he gave it up and entered
upon a long series of experiments with listening de-
vices, employing telephones, audions, towing devices,
resonators, etc. The Secretary of the Navy provided
Edison with a 200-foot vessel for his experiments,
and in the summer and fall of 191 7 they had pro-
gressed sufficiently to enable him to detect sounds
of moving vessels as far distant as five thousand
yards. This, however, was when the observing ves-
sel was at anchor. The results with the vessel under
way, at full speed, were not poor.

Having pushed the possibilities along this line to
their reasonable limit, Edison was of the opinion that
this plan would not be practical and he turned his
thoughts to another solution of the problem —
namely, to circumvent the destructive operation of
the submarine and avoid the loss of ships. He had
discovered in his experimenting that the noise made
by a torpedo in its swift passage through the water
was very marked and easily distinguishable from any
other sound.

With this fact as a basis, Edison, therefore,
evolved a new plan, which had two parts: first, to

261

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

provide merchant-ships with a listening apparatus
that would enable them, while going at full speed, to
hear the sound of a torpedo as soon as it was
launched from a submarine; and, second, to provide
the merchant-ships with means for quickly changing
their course to another course at right angles. Thus,
the torpedo would miss its mark and the merchant-
ship would be saved. If another torpedo should be
launched, the same tactics could be repeated.

His further investigations were conducted along
this line. After much experimenting he developed
a listening device in the form of an outrigger sus-
pended from the bowsprit. This device was so ar-
ranged that it hung partly in the water and would
always be from lo to 20 feet ahead of the vessel,
but could be swung inboard at any time. The device
was about 20 feet long and about 16 inches in width
and was made of brass and rubber. It contained
brass tubes, with a phonograph diaphragm at the
end which hung in the water. The listening appa-
ratus was placed in a small room in the bow of the
vessel. There were no batteries used. With this
listening apparatus, and while the vessel was going
full speed, moving boats 1,000 yards away could be
easily heard in rough seas. This meant that tor-
pedoes could be heard 3,000 yards away, as they are
by far the noisiest craft that "sail" the ocean.

The second step in Edison's plan — namely, the
quick changing of a ship's course, was accomplished
with the *'sea anchor." This device consists of a
strong canvas bag which is attachefl to a ship by long
ropes. When thrown overboard the bag opens, fills

262

EDISON AT WORK ON RUBBER EXPERIMENTS. FROM A MOVING PICTURE
TAKEN DECEMBER, 1 928

EDISON'S WORK DURING THE WAR

with water, and acts as a drag on a ship under way.
Edison's plan was to use four or more sea anchors
simultaneously. In a trial made with a steamship
325 feet long, draught 19 feet 6 inches, laden with
4,200 tons of coal, by the use of four sea anchors,
the vessel going at full speed, was turned at right
angles to her previous course with an advance of
only 200 feet, or less than her own length. This
means that if an enemy submarine had launched a
torpedo against the ship while she was on her orig-
inal course it would have passed by without harming
her, thus making submarine torpedo attack of no
avail. It may be noted parenthetically that this ap-
paratus has its uses in the merchant-marine in peace-
times. For instance, should the look-out on a steam-
ship running at full speed sight an iceberg 300 or
400 feet ahead this device could be instantly put
into use and the ship could be turned quickly enough
to avoid a collision.

There is only space for a passing mention of the
immense amount of data which Edison gathered,
tabulated, and charted in his study and evolution of
strategical plans suggested by him to the government
in the line of lessening the destruction by subma-
rines. He spent day and night for several months
with a number of assistants working out these plans.
It is not possible to make more specific mention of
them here, as they are too voluminous for these
pages.

With this tremendous amount of work pressing
on him he retained his accustomed good health and
buoyancy, due, undoubtedly, to his cheerful spirit,

26^

THE BOYS' LIFE OF EDISON

philosophical nature, and abstemious living. Soon
after the armistice was signed his experimental work
for the government came to an end, and he then
switched back to the general supervision of his busi-
ness interests and to his ceaseless experiments
through which he is continually making improve-
ments and refinements in the products of the large
industries which he established and in which he is
so greatly interested.

Mention should also be made of another extensive
project he has undertaken, and that is the production
of rubber from plants, weeds, bushes, shrubs, etc.,
grown in the United States. This he speaks of as
"emergency" rubber, to be resorted to in case our
country should ever be embarrassed in obtaining a
supply of rubber from present sources. This is a
tremendous problem, but he is applying to its solu-
tion the same resourceful powers that have char-
acterized his previous endeavors.

Herein, and in the development of new ideas, lies
Edison's daily work and pleasure, and although he
is in his eighties at this writing, with still boundless
energy, it may be said of him

'*Age cannot wither him, nor custom stale
His infinite variety."

2b4

Notable Events and

Achievements in the Life of

Thomas Alva Edison

Prepared for .the EdisoD Pioneers and copyrighted 1926 by
W. H. Meadowcroft, Historian.

1847 Born February 11th, at Milan, Ohio.

1854 Moved to Port Huron, Mich.

1857 Started chemical laboratorj' in cellar of his home.

1859 Became newsboy and ''candy butcher" on trains of Grand
Trunk Railway, running between I^ort Huron and De-
troit. (The whirligig of time brings about peculiar de-
velopments. The Edisoii Storage Battery, the Edison
Primary Battery and the Ediphone are now used by the
Gr?4nd Trunk Railway Company, on whose trains Edison
commenced life as a "newsie.")

1862 Printed and published a newspaper, "The Weekly Her-
ald^' on the train. The first newspaper .ever printed on
a moving train.

1862 Saved from death young son of J. U. Mackenzie, station
agent at Mount Clemens, Mich. In gratitude, the father
taught Edison telegraphy.

1862 Put up a telegraph line from Port Huron railway station
to. village and worked in local office.

1863 First position as regular telegraph operator on 'Grand
Trunk Railway, at Stratford Junction, Canada.

1863 Spent nearly five arduous years as a telegraph operator
to in various cities of the Central Western states, always

1868 studying and experimenting to improve the apparatus.

1868 Entered office of Western Union in Boston as operator*
Later, resigned to experiment on duplex system of teleg'
raphy, and went into private telegraph line business.

1868 Made his first patented invention, Electrical Vote Re-
corder. Application for patent signed October 11, 1868.

1869 Landed in New York City from Boston boat, poor and
in debt. Shortly afterward, looking for work, was in op-
erating room of Gold & Stock Telegraph Company when
apparatus broke down. No one but Edison could fix it
and he was given a job as sui>erinteudent at $300 a
noontb.

265

t869 Went into Partnership with Franklin L. Pope as elec-
trical engineer. Improved stock tickers and made new
inventions, among which was the "Universal" stock tick-
er, also the Unison Device.

1870 Received first money for inventions, $40,000. Opened man-
ufacturing shop in Newark, where he made tickers, etc.

1871 Assisted Sholes, the inventor of the typewriter, to make
the first successful working model.

1872 Worked on and completed many inventions, including
to raotograph, automatic telegraph systems, duplex, quadru-

1876 plex, sextuplex and multiplex telegraph systems; also
paraffin paper (came into use later for wrapping can-
dies) ; also the electric pen which, with other improve-
ments made by him, became the present day mimeograph ;
carbon rheostat, microtasimeter, etc. His invention of the
quadruplex system of telegraphy was a great develop-
ment in the art and saved the investment of many mil-
lions of dollars in wires.

1875 Discovered previously unknown and unique electric phe-
nomena, which he called **Etheric Force." Twelve years
afterward these phenomena were recognized as due to
electric waves in free space, and became the foundation
of wireless telegraphy.

1876 Moved from Newark to laboratory at Menlo Park, N. J.
to Invented the carbon telephone transmitter, which made

1877 telephony a commercial art. This invention included the
Microphone, which makes Radio possible.

Invented the phonograph. Patent was issued by United
States Patent Office within two months after application,
without a single reference,

1878 First half of year improving the phonograph. In sum-
mer went with astronomical party to Rawlins, Wyo., to
test his microtasimeter during a transit of Venus. On
returning commenced investigation of electric light prob-
lem,

1878 In a prophetic article in the North American Review Jie
foreshadowed ten prominent uses for the phonograph —
all since accomplished — including its combination with
the telephone, which became a reality in 1914 with the
perfection of the Telescribe.

1879 Invented incandescent electric lamp. The invention was
perfected October 21st, 1879, on which day there was
put into circuit the first lamp embodyin-^ the principles
pf the modem incandescent lamp, and this lamp main*
tdined its incandescence for over 40 hours,

266,

1879 Invented radical improvements of construction of dyna-
mos, including the mica laminated armature and mica
insulated commutator, and constructed the first practical
generators for systems of distribution of current for light,
heat and power. Invented systems of generation, distri-
bution, regulation and measurement of electric current.
Invented sockets, switches, insulating tape, etc. He also
invented gummed paper tape now in common use instead
of twine or string for securing packages.

1879 The first electric motor ever made for a commercial cir-
cuit of 110 to 120 volts was constructed by Edison at
Menlo Park, N. J., in 1879. This motor is still in exist-
ence and operative, and is in the Edison Historical Col-
lection.

1879 December 31. Gave public demonstration of electric
lighting system in streets and buildings at Menlo Park,
N. J., using underground mains.

1880 Invented further improvements in systems and details for
electric light, heat and power, and prepared to introduce
same commercially. Established first incandescent lamp
factory at Menlo Park, N. J.

1880 Invented magnetic ore separator.

1881 Opened business oflBces at No. 65 Fifth Avenue, New
York City.

1881 Established second and improved commercial incandes-
cent lamp factory at Harrison, N. J. Organized and es-
tablished shops at 104 Goerck St., 108 Wooster St., and
65 Washington St„ New York City, for the manufacture
of dynamos, underground conductors, sockets, switches,
fixtures, meters, etc.

1880 Invented and installed first life-sized electric railway for
to freight and passengers at Menlo Park, N, J.
1882

1882 September 4. Commenced operation of first commercial
central station in New York City for distribution of elec-
tric current for light, power and heat.

1883 First three-wire central station for electric lighting in-
stalled at Sunbury, Pa.

1883 Discovered a previously unknown phenomenon. .He
found that an independent wire or plate placed between
the legs of the filament of an incandescent lamp acted
as a valve to control the flow of current. This became
known as the ^'Edison effect." Patent was issued to him
in 1883, No. 307,031. This discovery covers the founda-
tion principle on which every modern Radio lamp (or
tube) is based.

!67/

1880 Strenuous years of invention and endeavor in eirtending,'
to improving and exploiting the electric light, heat and

1887 power systems. During these years he took out upwards
of three hundred patents, many of them of fundamental
importance such, for instance, as that covering the feed-
er system, and that covering the three-wire system.

1881 Invented system of wireless telegraphy, (by induction)
to to and from trains in motion, or between moving trains

1887 and railway stations. Installed on Lehigh Valley R.R. in
1887, and used several years. Also invented a wireless
system of communication between ships at sea, and be-
tween ships and the shore and between distant points on
land. Patent No. 465,971 was issued on this invention,
the application having been filed May 23, 1885, two
years before the publication of the work of Hertz. This
patent was sold by Edison to the Marconi Wireless Tele-
graph Company,

1887 Moved to preser^t laboratory at West Orange, New Jer-
sey.

1887 Invented improvements on present type of cylinder phon-
to ograph. In these four years took out over eighty patents

1890 on these improvements, and also established a very ex-
tensive commercial business in the manufacture and sale
of phonographs and records, including dictating machine,
shaveable record and shaving machine.

1891 Made a number of inventions relating to electric railways.
1891 Invented the motion picture camera. By the invention of

this mechanism, with the continuous tape-like film orig-
inated by Edison, it became possible to take and repro-
duce motion pictures as we have them at this day,

1891 These years were spent on the great iron ore concentrat-
to ing enterprise, in Which Edison did some of his most

1900 brilliant engineering work. He made many important
inventions during this period, among which were the
giant rolls for breaking large masses of rc«:k and the
three-high rolls for fine crushing. During this period he
also invented the Fluoroscope. Edison realized the neces-
sity and value of a practical fluorescent screen for mak-
ing examinations with the X-ray. He made thousands of
crystallizations of single and double chemical salts, and
6naily discovered that crystals of Calcium Tungstate made
in a particular way were highly fluorescent to the X-ray,
and invented the first Fluoroscope. He also made many
iraj)rovements in X-ray tube?

268

1900 This period covers the work resulting io the invention of
to the Edison -Stee! Alkaline Storage Batterjv and its comV
1910 merclal introduction.

1900 During these years,Edison established a Portland cemeift

to mil!. He made man>L important inventions relating to

1909 the method and processes involved in the pioduction of

Portland cement. Some of these, such as the long kiln,

are of great importance to the industry in general.

1902 Worked on improvements in the Edison Priimary Battery.'

1903 Made important inventions relating to phonqgraph cylin-
ders.

1905 Introduced new dictating machine, which enabled the
dictator to hear repetitions and make paper scale correc-
tions.

1907 Introduced for first time the Universal electric motor for'
operating dictating machines on all lighting circuiis,

191Q Worked on improved disc phonograph. This work re-
to suited in the production of an instrument and records

1914- which reproduce vocal and instrumental music with ab-
solute fidelity and sweetness. Improvements in recording
have been made, and all overtones are reproduced. The
diamond point reproducer and the indestructible record
are important inventions and, on the whole, Edison's disc
phonograph commenced a nev/ era in phonographs.

1$12 Introduced the Kinetophone or talking motion picture,
after spending much time in its development during a
number of years past. In 1887 he foreshadowed the pro-
duction of this combined device.

1913 Introduced automatic correction device for dictating
machine.

1914 Edison, being the largest individual user in the United
States of carbolic acid (for making phonograph records),
found himself in' danger of being compelled to close his
factory by reasort of the embargo placed on exportation
by England and Germany, the sources of supply, carbolic
acid being used in making explosives. Edison devised
a plan for making carbolic acid synthetically, set gangs
of men working twenty-four hours a day to build a
plant, and on eighteenth day was making acid. Within
four weeks the plant could turn out a ton a day.

1914 On the night of December 9th Edison's great plant at-
West Orange, N. J., was the scene of a great conflagra-
tion. Early next morning gangs of men were at work
clearing up the wreck. Hundreds more were added during
the day and work was continued twenty-four hours a day.
Within thirty-six hours after the fire Edison had given
ifuil orders for the complete Tehabilitation of the plant.

269

^H Invented the Telescribe, combining the telephone and th^
dictating phonograph, thus permitting the recording of
both sides of telephone messages,

1915 Very early in the year Edison found he was in danger of
being unable to obtain a continuous supply of benzol
from which he made his synthetic carbolic acid. The
European war had created an enormous demand and
supplies were uncertain. He decided to erect his own
benzol plants. He first looked up all the literature on
erection and operation of benzol absorbing plants, and
then made engineering plans for a type of plant that
could be quickly installed. Experimented on. and per-
fected it in his laboratory. He arranged with two coke
oven plants to put in his benzol plants. The first at the
Cambria Steel Company's plant at Johnstown, Pa., in-
stalled and put into operation in forty-five days. The
second at the plant of the Woodward Iron Company, at
Woodward, Ala., completed in 60 days. Ordinarily, it
requires about nine months to install a benzol plant.
Two other benzol plants were erected in Canada accord-
ing to his plans, each being completed and put in opera-
tion within sixty days. All these plants came into suc-
cessful commercial operation, producing benzol, toluol,
solvent naphtha, xylol and naphthaline for several years.

1915 About March, Edison conceived the idea of helping out
the textile and rubber industries of America by making
myrbane, aniline oil and aniline salt, which are always
in great demand and which had been previously im-
ported from Germany. He exhausted the literature on
the subject, as usual, then laid out the plant. By bring-
ing great pressure to bear, and working day and night,
he installed his plant in forty-five working days, com-
menced deliveries in June, and was soon turning out
over 4,000 pounds a day.

1915 The fur dyeing industry and other arts were suflrering
from a great scarcity of paraphenylenediamine, formerly
imported from Germany. Edison also uses it in the
manufacture of records for his Diamond Disc Phono-
.graph; being unable to procure it, he experimented in
his laboratory until he found a way to make it. Much
pressure was brought to bear on him to supply some of
it to fur dyers and others. He equipped a separate plant
for this 'and ultimately manufactured over, a ton a day,
thus relieving a serious situation.

J915 The great scarcity of carbolic acid in America brought
innumerable requests to Edison to sell some of bis prod-

270

uct. His first plant worked well, producing about 7,000
pounds a day. This, however, was not nearly sufficient
to supply the demand. He therefore projected and in-
stalled another plant with a capacity of about 7,000
pounds additional a day. As he devised improved pro-
cesses for use in this larger plant there were a vast num-
ber of difficult problems to solve, but with old-time
energy and dogged perseverance he overcame all after
many weeks of strenuous work.

1916 Worked several months making important improvements
in the manufacturing technique of disc phonograph rec-
ords, and on studies of new methods and devices for re-
cording. Worked on improved methods and processes for
his chemical products; also worked out processes for
making paramidaphenol, base and hydrochloride; benzi-
dine base and sulphate and constructed new plants for
their manufacture.

As President of the Nav'al Consulting Board did a large
amount of work during the year, connected with ques-
tion of national defense.

1917 Worked these years on special experiments on war prob-
and lems for the United States Government. Space will not
i918 permit details. Suffice it to say that he worked on the

following major problems, submitting reports from time
to time to the Secretary of the Navy:

1 Locating position of guns by sound-ranging.

2 Detecting submarines by sound from moving vessels.

3 Detecting on moving vessels the discharge of torpedoes
by submarines.

4 Quick turning of ships.

5 Strategic plans for saving cargo boats from submarines.^

6 Collision mats.

7 Taking merchant-ships out of mined harbors.

8 Oleum cloud shells.

•9 Camouflaging ships and burning^airthracite.

10 More power for torpedoes.

11 Coast patrol by submarine buoys.

12 Destroying periscopes with machine guns.

13 Cartridge for taking soundings.
14- Sailing-lights for convoys.

15 Smudging sky-line.

16 Obstructing torpedoes with nets.

17 Under-water search-light.

18 High-speed signalling with search-lights.

19 Water-penetrating projectile.

20 Airplane detection.

21 Observing periscopes in silhouette.

271

22 Steamship decoys.

23 Zigzagging.

24 Reducing rolling of warship.

25 Obtaining nitrogen from the air.

26 Stability of submerged submarines.

27 Hydrogen detector for submarines.

28 Induction balance' for submarine detection.

29 Turbine head for projectile.

30 Protecting observers from smoke-stack gas.

31 Mining Zeebrugge harbor.

32 Blinding submarine and periscopes.

33 Mirror-reflection system for warships.

34 Device for look-out men.

35 Extinguishing fires in coa! bunkers.'

36 Telephone system on ships.

37 Extension ladder for spotting-top.

38 Preserving submarine and other guns from rust,

39 Freeing range-finder from spray.

40 Smudging periscopes.

41 Night glass.
42'~Re-acting shell.

1919 In his zeal to serve the Government, Edison had left his
to business in charge of his officials for the two years he

date was so engaged. After the Armistice he returned to his
plant at Orange; N. J., and resumed the direction of his
affairs. In the years that have since passed he has per-
formed a prodigious amount of work in reorganizing his
plant, experimenting on new devices, processes and im-
provements, and perfecting many technical processes and
mechanisms, including the electric control of Executive
Model Edipbone, and other important developments.
Since the beginning of 1919 he has filed 44 applications
for patents and 40 patents have been issued to him in
that period. Altogether, about 1,150 patents have been
issued to him. During the last two or three years he has
taken over the active management of his commercial en»
terprises and carried them on with his accustomed vigor.!
He still works from 16 to 18 hours a day.

2^2